A NEW SCHOOL TERM
The next morning, as soon as breakfast was over, the unwilling Sarah
was called into conference in the office with her brother and Aunt
Trudy. The latter was much surprised to learn that she had lost a
ring, and insisted that Sarah, who was rather a favorite of hers,
should not be punished.
"I never did care anything about the ring, Hugh," said Aunt Trudy
earnestly, "and there's been trouble enough about it. It's just like
Rosemary to want to buy me another, but I'd never wear it, so why
should she? I'm glad enough that this ridiculous idea of hers has
been stopped before it went on any longer. Don't, for pity's sake,
say another word about that unfortunate ring."
"Well, Sarah, that let's you out," said Doctor Hugh cheerfully. "I
must say I think you've shirked all the way through, first in not
owning up and again in letting Rosemary take the responsibility of
replacing the ring. And you kept her from telling me, simply to
shield yourself. However, I really understand that you were afraid
and fear often keeps us from doing what we know to be right. You're
going to fight that little 'I'm-afraid'"--for he had had a brief
talk with his little sister the night before after the others had
left the office and felt that he was just beginning to understand
Sarah--"and put him in his place, which is behind you, and so we'll
start all over as long as Aunt Trudy is willing. Shall we?"
"Let's," said Sarah laconically, but she slipped a confiding small
hand in the doctor's larger one. He squeezed it affectionately.
"Now I must be off," he said, glancing at his watch. "Where is
Rosemary? I thought I'd take her with me this morning--the ride will
do her good. Practising?" he repeated as Sarah called his attention
to the sound of finger exercises. "Let her practise this
afternoon--she needs to get away from a fixed schedule now and
then."
Rosemary enjoyed this ride and the others that followed in quick
succession. Doctor Hugh, unknown to her, was realizing that every
one had been expecting too much of the oldest daughter of the
house, had looked to her, in fact, to grow up in one summer.
"Poor little kid!" thought the doctor one morning, as he allowed
Rosemary to take the wheel of the car on a level stretch of clear
road and the color came into her face from the excitement and
delight. "Poor little kid, we've been expecting her to have the
patience and wisdom and experience Mother has. She's only twelve
years old and we ask her to act like a woman. She's bound to make
mistakes, but she won't make the same one twice--I'll bank on that.
Temper and will, rightly directed, make for strength, and Rosemary
will be as lovely within some day as she is to the eye--and my
sister is going to be a beauty, or I miss my guess."
Aloud he said, "Watch the road, Rosemary. Never mind what is behind
you, watch the road ahead."
Coming in at noon from one of these rides with Doctor Hugh, Rosemary
found a small box, wrapped in white tissue paper and tied with pink
string, at her plate.
"It looks like a jeweler's box," she said jokingly as she opened it.
"Why it is!" she added in surprise.
Sarah and Shirley crowded around her as she opened it. A little
gold "friendship" circle pin, set with a single turquoise, lay on a
bed of blue cotton.
"How perfectly lovely!" cried Rosemary. "Is it mine?"
"Of course it is," said Sarah. "Jack and Shirley and I went to Mr.
Evans and bought it for you. Do you like it?"
"Why it's darling," the enthusiastic Rosemary assured her. "I never
saw a prettier pin. Look, Hugh, look Aunt Trudy," she said eagerly,
holding out the pin to them as they came in from the hall.
"Why don't you ask where we got the money to buy it?" suggested
Sarah and at that Doctor Hugh shouted with laughter.
"You'll be the death of me yet, Sarah," he protested. "Sit down,
people, do, and we'll begin luncheon while Sarah reveals her dark
secret."
"'Tisn't a secret," announced Sarah with dignity. "Hugh said we
might take the ring-fund money, Rosemary, and buy you something nice
with it, and if we saw anything we thought you'd like, to tell him,
and he'd give us as much more money as we needed. Then Aunt Trudy
said she wanted to put some money with the ring-fund money, and so
did Winnie and so did Jack, so everybody did. Oh, yes, Hugh did,
too. And we saw this pin and Shirley and I thought it would be nice
because it had the turquoise in it like Aunt Trudy's ring, and Jack
said it was a 'friendship circle' and that meant we were all friends
of yours. So we bought it and it was seven dollars and a half,"
concluded Sarah who was nothing if not thorough.
"It's just beautiful," said Rosemary, with an April face of smiles
and tears. "I'll always keep it and love you all for thinking so
much of me."
She had wondered several times about the ring money, but the doctor
had made no motion to give her back the bank. Neither had he
mentioned returning the money again. Rosemary supposed that he would
bring the subject up some time, but until he did she was content to
forget about it. She did not know till weeks afterward that it was
Jack Welles who had dissuaded the doctor from his plan to have the
"fund" returned to those who had paid it.
"Rosemary earned the money fairly and squarely," he argued. "She
earned it by the hardest kind of work and it seems mean to make her
feel cheap. Those women were paying for service and they got it,
and they don't think any the less of Rosemary, either, if Aunt Trudy
does moan along about 'degrading' the family. You're forever
preaching that there is no disgrace in any kind of honest work,
Hugh--"
"Oh, quit, I'm licked!" surrendered the doctor, laughing. "I won't
mention the money to Rosemary, Jack. Though when I think of that
child spending long, hot afternoons amusing cranky kids for
pay--Still, it's pluck like that that makes the backbone of our
country. What do you say if we take this money and buy her some
little personal gimcrack? Girls like things to wear, I've always
heard."
So Jack gained his point and the pretty pin was the result.
The days of vacation, "like the hairs of our heads" as Jack
observed, were numbered now and the week before school was to open,
Doctor Hugh made a flying trip to the sanatorium to see the little
mother.
"You wouldn't know her, girls!" he told the three sisters, when he
returned. "Her cheeks are actually a bit pink and though she is
still awfully thin, her eyes are clear and bright. If three months
can do her that much good, a year will set her on her feet. She says
she lives on your letters, and you mustn't let a week go past
without writing. Rosemary must be a good censor, for Mother doesn't
seem to worry about the house at all; I told her we were pulling
together famously."
"Well, we are," said Rosemary contentedly. "I wish you'd look at
Sarah, though, Hugh."
"I am looking at her," said the doctor. "She seems to have torn her
dress."
"That's the one decent dress she has," responded Rosemary severely,
"and now she hasn't a single thing to wear to school Monday."
"What does Mother do when you need clothes?" asked Doctor Hugh
helplessly. "I suppose you'll all need dresses for school, won't
you?"
"Mother has Miss Henry come and sew the first week in September,"
said Rosemary, "but Aunt Trudy says the sanatorium is expensive and
she thinks we ought to try and cut down living expenses."
"I think we can still afford some new frocks," replied her brother,
smiling. "Ask Aunt Trudy to engage Miss Henry, Rosemary, and to get
her whatever she needs to outfit you sensibly for school. You'll
have to remind me about shoes and hats and dresses, you know; an old
bachelor isn't expected to notice when these things wear shabby."
Miss Henry came and sewed a week, making new dresses and contriving
and turning to make the best of several old ones. Monday morning,
when school opened, the three Willis girls started off brave in new
ginghams and Doctor Hugh assured them that he was proud of them.
"I wish I was in high school," said Rosemary wistfully, as Jack
Welles joined them at the first corner.
"Two more years, and you will be," he consoled her. "I'll be a
senior then, and I'll see that no one steps on you, Rosemary."
"Oh, nobody will," said Rosemary confidently.
And indeed she looked quite capable of taking care of herself. There
was little of dependency about Rosemary and her lovely soft eyes
were balanced by the firm white chin. "She is easily hurt, but her
pride helps her to hide that," Winnie was fond of saying, "and don't
be after forgetting that there's red in her hair, under the gold!"
The Eastshore school was a splendid type of the modern school,
housing in one building the primary, grammar and high school
grades. Built on the extreme edge of the town, it faced an acre
play-ground, evenly divided among the three schools. Principals and
teachers were the best obtainable and indeed the State Board of
education was fond of using Eastshore school as a model for others
to follow. Mrs. Willis had often declared that she would never have
sent her son to boarding school had the public school then been as
excellent as that which Rosemary and her sisters attended.
This morning Rosemary was to enter the seventh grade in the grammar
school, Sarah would be in the fourth primary and Shirley, having
"graduated" from the kindergarten the year before, would attain the
dignity of a seat in the first grade. Separating at the broad door,
they were swept into the different streams that carried them up
different stairways and into different classrooms and it was noon
before they saw each other again. Few of the pupils went home to
lunch and a large, light airy room on the third floor was set aside
for their use as a lunch room. A corner table was reserved for
teachers and here a small group usually gathered not only to eat and
exchange comment, but to keep an eye on the lunchers and subdue the
noise when it rose to a shout. The high school students had their
own lunch room, but the grammar and primary grades shared a room
together.
"Well, what kind of people are in your room?" demanded Sarah, as she
and Shirley met Rosemary at the little corner table the latter had
secured and held for them. Rosemary had spread out the lunch Winnie
had put up for them, and Shirley was already beginning on a
sandwich.
"Oh, I like the girl who sits in front of me ever so much," returned
Rosemary, cutting an apple into quarters for Shirley. "Her name is
Elsie Stevens and they haven't lived in Eastshore long. Last year
she went to the Port Reading school. Elsie Mears sits in back of me;
she wasn't promoted. And Nina Edmonds is across the aisle."
"I don't think much of our teacher," announced Sarah, with
deplorable frankness. "She doesn't look very bright and she says she
is afraid of snakes."
"Well so am I," declared Rosemary. "I don't think any one is very
bright who isn't."
"That's because you don't know anything about snakes," said Sarah,
salting a boiled egg hurriedly. "Snakes are the best friends the
farmer has."
"My teacher's name is Miss Farmer," chirped Shirley sunnily. "And
we have pink and red and blue crayons to draw on the blackboard
with."
"Take another sandwich, darling," Rosemary urged her. "You're sure
you won't get tired this afternoon? You went home at noon every day
last year, you know."
"Yes, but I'm six now," Shirley reminded her sister. "Will we have
home work in our room, Rosemary?"
It was one of Shirley's ambitions to have "home work" to do, and she
longed to take a book home at night as Rosemary and Sarah did.
"I don't know--I shouldn't think so," answered Rosemary absently.
"Sarah, Nina Edmonds wears her hair pinned up and no hair-ribbon."
"Well she looks crazy anyway, so what difference does it make?" was
Sarah's comment on this news. "You can't go without a hair-ribbon,
Rosemary, because your hair will all be in your eyes. Hugh said Nina
was trying to be grown up and I guess she is."
But that night Rosemary spent half an hour before her mirror, trying
to coax her bobbed curls into a knot like Nina Edmonds'. Rosemary's
hair was growing very fast and she had promised Doctor Hugh not to
have it cut again. Just now it was an awkward length, but its
curliness redeemed even that. Nina's straight blond locks were
strained into a tortuous knot at the nape of her neck, for she, too,
had decided not to bob her hair again. It was the absence of
hair-ribbon that particularly appealed to Rosemary, for she had
"spells" as Winnie called them, of wishing to appear grown up. At
other times she was satisfied to be what Doctor Hugh insisted she
should be content to be for several more years, "just a little
girl."