THE HOME-SICK AND THE REBELLIOUS.
Kathleen O'Hara ran up to an untidy room. She banged-to the door, and
standing by it for a moment, drew the bolt. Thus she had secured herself
against intrusion. She then flung herself on the bed, put her two arms
under her head, and gazed out of the window. Her heart was beating
wildly; she had a strange medley of feelings within. She was
desperately, madly lonely. She was homesick in the most intense sense of
the word.
Kathleen had never left Carrigrohane Castle before. This romantic abode
was situated in the extreme south-west of Ireland. It was a mile away
from the sea, and stood on a rocky eminence which overlooked a very wide
expanse of moor and wood, rushing streams and purple mountains, and deep
dark-blue sea. In the whole world there could scarcely be found a more
lovely view than that which since her birth had presented itself before
Kathleen's young eyes. Her father, Squire O'Hara, was, as landlords in
Ireland go, very well off. His tenantry adored him. He got in his rents
with tolerable regularity. He was a good landlord, firm but also kind
and indulgent. A real case of distress was never turned away from his
doors, but where rent could be paid he insisted on the cottars giving
him his due. He kept a rather wild establishment, however. His wife was
an Irishwoman from a neighboring county, and had some of the most
careless attributes of her race. The house got along anyhow. There were
always shoals of visitors, mostly relatives. There were heavy feasts in
the old hall, and sittings up very late at night, and no end of hunting
and fishing and shooting in their seasons. In the summer a pretty white
yacht made a great "divartisement," as the Squire was fond of saying;
and in all things Kathleen O'Hara was free as the air she breathed. She
was educated in a sort of fashion by an Irish governess, but in reality
she was allowed to pursue her lessons exactly as she liked best herself.
It was just before she was fifteen that Kathleen's aunt, a maiden lady
from Dublin, who rejoiced in the truly Irish name of O'Flynn, came to
see them, remarked on Kathleen's wild, unkempt appearance, declared that
the girl would be a downright beauty when she was eighteen, said that no
one would tolerate such a want of knowledge in the present day, and
advised that she should go to school. Mrs. O'Hara took Miss O'Flynn's
hint very much to heart. Kathleen was consulted, and of course tabooed
the entire scheme; in the end, however, the elder ladies carried the
day. Miss O'Flynn took her niece to Dublin with her, and gave her an
expensive and very unnecessary wardrobe; and Mrs. O'Hara, having heard a
great deal of Mrs. Tennant, who had Irish relatives, decided that
Kathleen should go to the Great Shirley School, where she herself had
been educated long ago. Everything was arranged in a great hurry. It
seemed to Kathleen now, as she lay on her bed, kicking her feet
impatiently, and ruffled her beautiful hair, that the thing had come to
pass in a flash. It seemed only yesterday that she was at home in the
old house, petted by the servants, adored by her father, worshipped by
all her relatives--the young queen of the castle, free as the air,
followed by her dogs, riding on her pony--and now she was here in this
hideous, poor, fifth-class house, going to that ugly school.
"I can't stand it," she thought. "There's only one way out. I must have
a real desperate burst of naughtiness. What shall I do that will most
aggravate them? For do that thing I will, and as quickly as possible."
Kathleen thought rapidly. She had no brothers of her own, but their loss
was made up for by the adoration of about twenty young cousins who were
always loafing about the place and following Kathleen wherever she
turned.
"What would most aggravate Pat if he were here," thought the girl, "or
dear old Michael? Ah, well! Michael--" The girl's face slightly changed.
"I was never _very_ naughty with Michael," she said to herself. "He is
different from the others. I wouldn't like to see that sort of sorry
look in his dear dark-blue eyes. Oh, I mustn't think of Michael now.
When I was going away he said, 'Bedad, you'll come back a princess, and
I'll be proud to see you.' No, I mustn't think of Michael. Pat, the imp,
would help me, and so would Rory, and so would Ted. But what shall it
be?"
She thought excitedly. There came a rattle at the handle of the door.
"Let me in, please, Kathleen; let me in," called Alice's voice.
"Presently, darling," replied Kathleen in her most nonchalant tone.
"But I am in a hurry. I must be back at school by half-past two. Let me
in immediately."
"What a nuisance it all is!" thought Kathleen. "But, after all, my
naughtiness needn't make that stupid old Alice late for her darling
lessons."
She scrambled off the bed, drew back the bolt, and returned to her old
position. Alice came quickly in. She glanced at Kathleen with disgust.
"I wish you wouldn't lie on the bed in your muddy boots."
No answer.
"I must ask you not to lock the door. It is my room as well as yours."
No answer. Kathleen's eyes were fixed on the window; they were brimful
of mischief. After a time she said:
"Darling."
"I wish you wouldn't talk to me in that silly way."
"Faith! honey, then."
"I do wish--"
Kathleen suddenly sprang upright on her bed.
"Don't you like the sky when it looks as it does now? I wish you could
see it from Carrigrohane. You don't know the sort of expression it has
when it seems to be kissing the sea. We have a ghost at Carrigrohane.
Oh, wisha, then, if you only could see it! I can tell the boys about it.
Sha'n't I make them creep?"
"It is very silly to talk about ghosts. Nobody believes in them," said
Alice.
"I'll ask father if I may have you at Carrigrohane in the summer, and
then see if you don't believe. She wears white."
"I am going out now, Kathleen; aren't you coming with me?"
"No, thank you, my love."
"You ought to, Kathleen. I am busy preparing for my scholarship
examination or I would stay and argue with you. It is an awful pity to
have gone to the expense of coming here if you don't mean to do your
utmost."
"Thank you, darling, but it is rather a waste of breath for you to talk
so long to me. I mean to be naughty this afternoon."
"I can't help you," said Alice. "I am very sorry you ever came."
"Thank you so much, dear."
Alice ran downstairs.
"Mother," she said, rushing into her mother's presence, "we shall have
no end of trouble with that terrible girl. She is lying now on the bed
with her outdoor boots on, and she won't come to school, or do a single
thing I want her to."
"The money her father pays will be very welcome, Alice. We must bear
with some discomforts on account of that."
"I suppose so," said Alice, shrugging her shoulders. "How horrid it is
to be poor, and to have such a girl as that in the house! Well, I can't
stay another minute. You had better keep a sort of general eye on her,
mother, for there's no saying what she will do. She has declared her
intention of being naughty. She knows no fear, is not guided by any sort
of principle, and would, in short, do anything."
"Well, go to school, Alice, and be quick home, for I have a great deal I
want you to help me with."
Alice made no reply, and Mrs. Tennant, after thinking for a minute, went
upstairs. She knocked at the door of the room which she had given up to
the two girls. There was no answer. She opened it and went in. The bird
had flown. There were evident signs of a stampede through the window,
for it stood wide open, and there were marks of not too clean boots on
the drugget, and a torn piece of ivy just without. The window was twenty
feet from the ground, and Kathleen must have let herself down by the
sturdy arm of the old ivy. Mrs. Tennant looked out, half expecting to
see a mangled body on the ground; but there was no one in view. She
returned to her darning and her anxious thoughts.
She was a widow with two sons and a daughter, and something under two
hundred and fifty pounds a year on which to live. To educate the boys,
to do something for Alice, and to put bread-and-butter into all their
mouths was a difficult problem to solve in these expensive days. She had
on purpose moved close to the Great Shirley School in order to avail
herself of its cheap education for Alice. The boys went to another
foundation school near by; and altogether the family managed to scrape
along. But the advent of Kathleen on the scene was a great relief, for
her father paid three guineas a week for Mrs. Tennant's motherly care
and for Kathleen's board and lodging.
"Poor child!" thought the good woman. "What a wild, undisciplined,
handsome creature she is! I must do what I can for her."
She sat on for some time darning and thinking. Her heart was full; she
felt depressed. She had been working in various ways ever since six
o'clock that morning, and the darning of the boys' rough socks hurt her
eyes and made her fingers ache.
Meanwhile Kathleen was running along the road. She ran until she was
completely out of breath. She then came to a stile, against which she
leant. By-and-by she saw a girl walking leisurely up the road; she was a
shabbily dressed and rather vulgar girl. Kathleen saw at once that she
was one of the Great Shirley girls, so she went forward and spoke to
her.
"You go to our school, don't you?" she said.
"Yes, miss," answered the girl, dropping a little curtsy when she saw
Kathleen. She was a very fresh foundation girl, and recognized something
in Kathleen which caused her to be more subservient than was necessary.
"Then, if you please," continued Kathleen, "can you tell me where that
sweetly pretty girl, Ruth Craven, lives?"
"She isn't a lady," said the girl, whose name was Susan Hopkins. "She is
no more a lady than I am."
"Indeed she is," said Kathleen. "She is a great deal more of a lady than
you are."
The girl flushed.
"You are a Great Shirley girl yourself," she said. "I saw you there
to-day. You are in an awfully low class. Do you like sitting with the
little kids? I saw you towering up in the middle of them like a
mountain."
Kathleen's eyes flashed.
"What is your name?" she asked.
"Susan Hopkins. I used to be a Board School girl, but now I am on the
foundation at Great Shirley. It is a big rise for me. Are you a poor
girl? Are you on the foundation?"
"I don't know what it means by being on the foundation, but I don't
think I am poor. I think, on the contrary, that I am very rich. Did you
ever hear of a girl who lived in a castle--a great beautiful castle--on
the top of a high hill? If you ever did, I am that girl."
"Oh, my!" said Susy Hopkins. "That does sound romantic."
Her momentary dislike to Kathleen had vanished. The desire to go to the
town on a message for her mother had completely left her. She stood
still, as though fascinated.
"I live there," said Kathleen--"that is, I do when I am at home. I come
from the land of the mountain and the stream; of the shamrock; of the
deep, deep blue sea."
"Ireland? Are you Irish?" said the girl.
"I am proud to say that I am."
"We don't think anything of the Irish here."
"Oh, don't you?"
"But don't be angry, please," continued Susy, "for I am sure you are
very nice."
"I am nice when I like. To-day I am nasty. I am wicked to-day--quite
wicked; I could hate any one who opposes me. I want some one to help me;
if some one will help me, I will be nice to that person. Will you?"
"Oh, my word, yes! How handsome you look when you flash your eyes!"
said Susy Hopkins.
"Then I want to find that dear little girl, who is so beautiful that I
love her and can't get her out of my head. I want to find Ruth Craven.
She went away with a horrid, stiff, pokery girl called Cassandra Weldon.
You have such strange names in your country. That horrid, prim Cassandra
chose to correct me when I came into school, and she has taken my
darling away--the only one I love in the whole of England. I want to
find her. I will give you--- I will give you an Irish diamond set in a
brooch if you will help me."
This sounded a very grand offer indeed to Susy Hopkins, who lived in the
most modest way, and had not a jewel of any sort in her possession.
"I will help you. I will, and I can. I know where Miss Weldon lives. I
can take you to her house."
"But I want Ruth."
"If she has taken Ruth home, she will be at Cassandra's house," said
Susy.
"And you can take me there?"
"This blessed minute."
"All right; come along."
"When will you give me the diamond set in the brooch?"
"It isn't a real diamond, you know. It is an Irish diamond set in
silver--real silver. My old nurse had it made for me, and I wear it
sometimes. I will bring it to you to school to-morrow."
"Oh, thank you--thank you, Miss--I forgot your name."
"O'Hara--Kathleen O'Hara."
"O'Hara is rather a difficult name to say. May I call you Kathleen?"
"Just as you please, Susan. It is more handy for me to say Susan than
Hopkins. As long as I am in England I must consort, I see, with all
kinds of people; and if you will make yourself useful to me, I will be
good to you."
Susy turned and led the way in the direction of Cassandra Weldon's home.
They had to walk across a very wide field, then down a narrow lane, then
up a steep hill, and then into a valley. At the bottom of the valley was
a straight road, and at each side of the road were neat little
houses--small and very proper-looking. Each house consisted of two
stories, with a hall door in the middle and a sitting room on each side.
There were three windows overhead, and one or two attics in the roof.
The houses were very compact; they were new, and were called by
ambitious names. For instance, the house where the Weldons lived went by
the ambitious name of Sans Souci. All through the walk Susy chatted for
the benefit of her companion. She told Kathleen so much about her life
that she was interested in spite of herself! and by the time they
arrived outside Sans Souci, Kathleen's hand was lying affectionately on
her companion's arm.
"I had best not go in, miss," she said. "Cassandra Weldon would never
take the very least notice of me; and none of us foundation girls like
her at all."
"Well, it is extremely unfair," said Kathleen. "From all you have been
telling me, the foundation girls must be particularly clever. I tell you
what it is: I think I shall take to you."
"Oh, would you, indeed, miss?" said Susy, her eyes sparkling. "There are
a hundred of us, you know, in the school."
"That is a great number. And Ruth Craven is really one?"
"She is, miss. She isn't a bit better than the rest of us."
"And I love her already."
"She is no better than the rest of us," repeated Susan Hopkins.
"I have a great mind to take to you all, to make a fuss about you, and
to show the others how badly they behave."
"You'd be a queen amongst us; there's no doubt about that."
"It would be lovely, and it would be a tremendous bit of naughtiness,"
thought Kathleen.
"Do you think you will, miss? Because, if you do, I will tell the
others. We could meet you and talk over things."
"Well, I will decide to-morrow. I will enclose a letter with your
brooch. Good-bye now; I must go in and kiss my darling Ruth."
Susy Hopkins stood for a minute to watch Kathleen as she went up the
little narrow path of Sans Souci. When Kathleen reached the porch she
waved her hand, and Susy, putting wings to her feet, ran as fast as she
could in the opposite direction. She felt very much elated and really
pleased. In the whole course of her life she had never met a girl of the
Kathleen O'Hara type before. Her beauty, her daring and wild manner, the
flash in her bright dark eyes, the glints of gold in her lovely hair,
all fascinated Susy.
"What a queen she'd make!" she thought. "We must make her our queen.
We'd have quite a party of our own in the school if she took us up. And
she will; I'm sure she will. This is a lark. This is worth a great
deal."
Meanwhile Kathleen rang the bell at Sans Souci in a very smart,
imperative manner. A little maid, neatly dressed, came to the door.
"Please," said Kathleen, "will you say that Miss O'Hara has called and
would be glad to see Miss Ruth Craven for a few minutes?"
The girl withdrew. Presently she returned.
"Mrs. Weldon will be pleased if you will go in, miss. She is sitting in
the drawing-room. The two young ladies are out in the garden."
"Thank you," said Kathleen.
After a brief hesitation she entered the house, and was conducted across
the narrow hall into a very sweet and charmingly furnished room. The
room had a bay-window with French doors; these opened on to a little
flower-lawn. At one side of the house was a tiny conservatory full of
bright flowers. Compared to the house where the Tennants lived, this
tiny place looked like a paradise to Kathleen. She gave a quick glance
round her, then came up to Mrs. Weldon.
"I am one of the new girls at the Great Shirley School," she said. "My
name is Kathleen O'Hara. I am Irish. I have only just crossed the cold
sea. I am lonely, too. I want Ruth Craven. May I sit down a minute while
your servant fetches her? I like Ruth Craven. She is very pretty, isn't
she? She is the sort of girl that you'd take a fancy to when you're
lonely and far from home. May I sit here until she comes?"
"Of course, my dear," said Mrs. Weldon, speaking with kindness, and
looking with eyes full of interest at the handsome, striking-looking
girl. "I quite understand your being lonely. I was very lonely indeed
when I came home from India and left my dear father and mother behind
me."
"How old were you when you came home?"
"A great deal younger than you are: only seven years old. But that is a
long time ago. I should like to be kind to you, Miss O'Hara. Cassandra
has been telling me about you. You are living at the Tennants', are you
not? Alice Tennant and Cassandra are great friends."
"But I don't like either of them," said Kathleen in her blunt way.
Mrs. Weldon looked a little startled.
"Do you know my daughter?" she asked.
"She is much too interfering, and she is frightfully stuck-up. Please
forgive me, but I am always very plain-spoken; I always tell the truth.
I don't want her. I like you, and wish that I lived with you, and that
you'd have Ruth Craven instead of your own daughter in the house. Then
I'd be perfectly happy. I always did say what I thought. Will you
forgive me?"
"I will, dear, because at the present moment you don't know my girl at
all. There never was a more splendid girl in all the world, but she
requires to be known. Ah! here she comes, and your little friend, Miss
Craven, with her."
Ruth, looking very pretty, with a delicate flush on each cheek, now
entered the room in the company of Cassandra. Kathleen sprang up the
minute she saw Ruth, rushed across the room, and flung one arm with
considerable violence round her neck.
"You have come," she said. "I have been hunting the place for you. How
dared you go away and hide yourself? Don't you know that you belong to
me? The moment I saw you I knew that you were my affinity. Don't you
know what an affinity means? Well, you are mine. We were twin souls
before birth; now we have met again and we cannot part. I am ever so
happy when I am with you. Don't mind those others; let them stare all
they like. I am going to take you foundation girls up. I have made up
my mind. We will have a rollicking good time--a splendid time. We will
be as naughty as we like, and we will let the others see what we are
made of. It will be war to the knife between the foundation girls and
the good, proper, paying girls. Let the ladies look after themselves. We
of the foundation will lead our own life, and be as happy as the day is
long. Aren't you glad to see me, dear, sweet, pretty Ruth? Don't you
know for yourself that you are my affinity--my chosen friend, my
beloved? Through the ages we have been one, and now we have met in the
flesh."
"I think," said Cassandra, at last managing to get herself heard, "that
you have said enough for the present, Miss O'Hara. Ruth Craven has come
to spend the day with me. I know that you are an Irish girl, and you
must be lonely. I shall be very pleased if you will join Ruth and me in
our walk. We are going for a walk across the common.--We shall be in to
tea, dear mother. Will you have it ready for us not later than five
o'clock? And I am sure you will join me, mother darling, in asking Miss
O'Hara to stay, too."
"But Miss O'Hara doesn't want to join either you or your 'mother
darling,'" said Kathleen in her rudest tone. "It is Ruth I want. I have
come here for her. She must return with me at once."
"But I can't. I am ever so sorry, Miss O'Hara."
"You mean that you won't come when I have called for you?"
"I am with Miss Weldon at present."
"Be sensible, dear," said Mrs. Weldon at that moment. "You don't quite
understand our manners in this country. However attached we may be to a
person, we don't enter a strange house and snatch that person out of it.
It isn't our way; and I don't think--you will forgive me for saying
it--that your way is as nice as ours. Be persuaded, dear, and join
Cassandra and Ruth, and have a happy time."
Kathleen's face had turned crimson. She looked from Mrs. Weldon to
Cassandra, and then she looked at Ruth. Suddenly her eyes brimmed up
with tears.
"I don't think I can ever change my way," she said. "I am sorry if I am
rude and not understood. Perhaps, after all, I am mistaken, about Ruth;
perhaps she is not my real proper affinity. I am a very unhappy girl. I
wish I could go back to mother and to my dad. I shouldn't be lonely if I
were in the midst of the mountains, and if I could see the streams and
the blue sea. I don't know why Aunt Katie O'Flynn sent me to this horrid
place. I wish I was back in the old country. They don't talk as you talk
in the old country and they don't look as you look. If you put your
heart at the feet of a body in old Ireland, that body doesn't kick it
away. I will go. I don't want your tea. I don't want anything that you
have to offer me. I don't like any of you. I am sorry if you think me
rude, but I can't help myself. Good-bye."
"No, no; stay. Stay and visit with me, and tell me about the old country
and the sea and the mountains," said Mrs. Weldon.
But Kathleen shook her head fiercely, and the next moment left the room.
"Poor, strange little girl," thought the good woman. "I see she is about
to heap unhappiness on herself and others. What is to be done for her?"
"I like her," said Ruth. "She is very impulsive, but she is------"
"Oh, yes," said Cassandra, "she has a good heart, of course; but I
foresee that she is up to all sorts of mischief. She doesn't understand
our ways. Why did she leave her own country?"
Ruth was silent. She looked wistful.
"Come along, Ruthie; we will be late. I have no end of schemes in my
head. I mean to help you. You will win that scholarship."
Ruth smiled. Presently she and Cassandra were crossing the common
arm-in-arm. In the interest of their own conversation they forgot
Kathleen.
When that young lady left the house she ran back to the Tennants'.
"I will write to dad to-night and tell him that I can't stay," she
thought. "Oh, dear, my heart is in my mouth! I shall have a broken heart
if this sort of thing goes on."
She entered the house. There sat Mrs. Tennant with a great basket of
stockings before her. The remains of a rough-looking tea were on the
table. The boys had disappeared.
"Come in, Kathleen," called Mrs. Tennant, "and have your tea. I want
Maria to clear the tea-things away, as I have some cutting out to do; so
be quick, dear."
Kathleen entered. The untidy table did not trouble her in the least; she
was accustomed to things of that sort at home. She sat down, helped
herself to a thick slice of bread-and-butter, and ate it, while burning
thoughts filled her mind.
"Have some tea. You haven't touched any," said Mrs. Tennant.
"I'd rather have cold water, please," Kathleen replied.
She went to the sideboard, filled a glass, and drank it off.
"Mrs. Tennant," she said when she had finished, "what possessed you to
live in England? You had all the world to choose from. Why did you come
to a horrible place like this?"
"But I like it," said Mrs. Tennant.
"You don't look as if you did. I never saw such a worn-out poor body.
Are you awfully old?"
"You would think me so," replied Mrs. Tennant, with a smile; "but as a
matter of fact I am not forty yet."
"Not forty!" said Kathleen. "But forty's an awful age, isn't it? I mean,
you want crutches when you are forty, don't you?"
"Not as a rule, my dear. I trust when I am forty I shall not want a
crutch. I shall be forty in two years, and that by some people is
considered young."
"Then I suppose it is mending those horrid stockings that makes you so
old."
"Mending stockings doesn't help to keep you young, certainly."
"Shall I help you? I used to cobble for old nurse when I was at home."
"But I shouldn't like you to cobble these."
"Oh, I can darn, you know."
"Then do, Kathleen. I should take it very kindly if you would. Here is
worsted, and here is a needle. Will you sit by me and tell me about your
home?"
Kathleen certainly would not have believed her own ears had she been
told an hour ago that she would end her first fit of desperate
naughtiness by darning stockings for the Tennant boys. She did not darn
well; but then, Mrs. Tennant was not particular. She certainly--although
she said she would not--did cobble these stockings to an extraordinary
extent; but her work and the chat with Mrs. Tennant did her good, and
she went upstairs to dress for supper in a happier frame of mind.
"I will stay here for a little," she said finally to Mrs. Tennant,
"because I think it will help you. You look so terribly tired; and I
don't think you ought to have this horrible work to do. I'd like to do
it for you, but I don't suppose I shall have time. I will stay for a bit
and see what I can make of the foundation girls."
"The foundation girls?"
"Oh, yes; don't ask me to explain. There are a hundred of them at the
Great Shirley School, and I am going--No, I can't explain. I will stop
here instead of running away. I meant to run away when my affinity would
have nothing to do with me."
"Really, Kathleen, you are a most extraordinary girl."
"Of course I am," said Kathleen. "Did you ever suppose that I was
anything else? I am very remarkable, and I am very naughty. I always
was, and I always will be. I am up to no end of mischief. I wish you
could have seen me and Rory together at home. Oh, what didn't we do? Do
you know that once we walked across a little bridge of metal which is
put between two of the stables? It is just a narrow iron rod, six feet
in length. If we had either of us fallen we'd have been dashed to pieces
on the cobble-stones forty feet below. Mother saw me when I was half-way
across, and she gave a shriek. It nearly finished me, but I steadied
myself and got across. Oh, it was jolly! I am going to set some of the
foundation girls at that sort of thing. I expect I shall have great fun
with them. It is principally because my affinity won't have anything to
do with me; she is attaching herself to another, and that other is
little better than a monster. Your Alice won't like me; and, to be frank
with you, I don't like her. I like you, because you are poor and
worried and seem old for your age--although your age is a great one--and
because you have to cobble those horrid socks. There! good-bye for the
present. Don't hate me too much; I can't help the way I am made. Oh; I
hear Alice. What a detestable voice she has! Now then, I'm off."
Kathleen ran up to her room, and again she locked the door. She heard
Alice's step, and she felt a certain vindictiveness as she turned the
key in the lock. Alice presently took the handle of the door and shook
it.
"Let me in at once, Kathleen," she said. "I really can't put up with
this sort of thing any longer. I want to get into my room; I want to
tidy myself. I am going to supper to-night with Cassandra Weldon."
"Then you don't get in," whispered Kathleen to herself. Aloud she said:
"I am sorry, darling, but I am specially busy, and I really must have my
share of the room to myself."
"Do open the door, Kathleen," now almost pleaded poor Alice. "If you
want your share of the room, I want mine. Don't you understand?"
"I am not interfering, dearest," called back Kathleen, "and I am keeping
religiously to my own half. I have the straight window, and you have the
bay. I am not touching your beautiful half; I am only in mine."
"Let me in," called Alice again, "and don't be silly."
"Sorry, dear; don't think I am silly."
There was a silence. Alice went on her knees and peered through the
keyhole: Kathleen was seated by her dressing-table, and there was a
sound of the furious scratching of a pen quite audible. "This is
intolerable," thought Alice. "She is the most awful girl I ever heard
of. I shall be late. Mary Addersley and Rhoda Pierpont are to call for
me shortly, and I shan't be ready. I don't want to appeal to mother or
to be rude to the poor wild thing the first day. Stay, I will tempt
her.--Kathleen!"
"Yes, darling."
"Wouldn't you like to come with me to Cassandra Weldon's? She is so
nice, and so is her mother. She plays beautifully, and they will sing."
"Irish songs?" called out Kathleen.
"I don't know. Perhaps they will if you ask them."
"Thanks," replied Kathleen; "I am not going." Again there was silence,
and the scratching of the pen continued. Alice was now obliged to go
downstairs to acquaint her mother.
"What is it, dear? Why, my dear Alice, how excited you look!"
"I have cause to be, mother. I have come in rather late, very much
fagged out from a day of hard examination work and that imp--that horrid
girl--has locked me out of my bedroom. I was so looking forward to a
nice little supper with Cassandra and the other girls! Kathleen won't
let me in; she really is intolerable. I can't stay in the room with her
any longer; she is past bearing. Can't you give me an attic to myself at
the top of the house?"
"You know I haven't a corner."
"Can't I share your bed, mummy? I shall be so miserable with that
dreadful Kathleen."
"You know quite well, Alice, that that is the only really good bedroom
in the house, and I can't afford to give it to one girl by herself. I
think Kathleen will be all right when we really get to know her; but she
is very undisciplined. Still, three guineas a week makes an immense
difference to me, Alice. I can't help telling you so, my child."
"In my opinion, it is hardly earned," said Alice. "I suppose I must
stay down here and give up my supper. I can't go like this, all untidy,
and my hair so messy, and my collar--oh, mother, it is nearly black! It
is really too trying."
"I will go up and see if I can persuade her," said Mrs. Tennant.
She went upstairs, turned the handle of the door, and spoke. The moment
her voice penetrated to Kathleen's ears, she jumped to her feet, crossed
the room, and bent down at the other side of the keyhole.
"Don't tire your dear voice," she said. "What is it you want?"
"I want you to open the door, Kathleen. Poor Alice wants to get in to
get her clothes. It is her room as much as yours. Let her in at once, my
dear."
"I am very sorry, darling Mrs. Tennant, but I am privately engaged in my
own half of the room. I am not interfering with Alice's."
"But you see, Kathleen, she can't get to her half."
"The door is in my half, you know," said Kathleen very meekly, "so I
don't see that she has any cause to complain. I am awfully sorry; I will
be as quick as I can."
"You annoy me very much. You make me very uncomfortable by going on in
this extremely silly way, Kathleen."
"I will darn some more socks for you, darling, tired pet," whispered
Kathleen coaxingly. "I really am awfully sorry, but there is no help for
it. I must finish my own private affairs in my own half of the room."
She retreated from the door, and the scratching of the pen continued.
Alice downstairs felt like a caged lion. Mrs. Tennant admitted that
Kathleen's conduct was very bad.
"It won't happen again, Alice," she said, "for I shall remove the key
from the lock. She won't shut you out another time. Make the best of it,
darling. If we don't worry her too much she is sure to capitulate."
"Not she. She is a perfect horror," said Alice.
Mrs. Weldon's supper party was to begin at eight o'clock. It was now
seven, and the girls were to call for Alice at half-past. If Kathleen
would only be quick she might still have time.
The boys came in. They stared open-eyed at Alice when they saw her still
sitting in her rough school things, a very cross expression on her face.
David came up to her at once; he was the favorite, and people said he
had a way with him. Whatever they meant by that, most people did what
David Tennant liked. He stood in front of his sister now and said:
"What's the matter? And where's the little Irish beauty?"
"For goodness' sake don't speak about her," said Alice. "She's driving
me nearly mad."
"Your sister is naturally much annoyed, David," said his mother.
"Kathleen is evidently a very tiresome girl. She has locked the door of
their mutual bedroom, and declines to open it; she says that as the door
happens to be in her half of the room, she has perfect control over it."
David whistled. Ben burst out laughing.
"Well, now that is Irish," David said.
"If you take her part I shall hate you all the rest of my life," said
Alice, speaking with great passion.
"But can't you wait just for once?" asked David. "Any one could tell
she is just trying it on. She'll get tired of sitting there by herself
if only you have patience."
"But I am due at Cassandra's for supper" and Mary Addersley and Rhoda
Pierpont are to call for me at half-past seven."
"Oh, that's it, is it?" said David.--"Ben, leave off teasing." For Ben
was whistling and jumping about, and making the most expressive faces at
poor Alice,--"I will see what I can do," he said, and he ran upstairs.
David was very musical; indeed, the soul of music dwelt in his eyes, in
his voice, in his very step. He might in some respects have been an
Irish boy himself. He bent down now and whistled very softly, and in the
most flute-like manner, "Garry Owen" through the keyhole. There was a
restless sound in the room, and then a cross voice said:
"Go away."
David stopped whistling "Garry Owen," and proceeded to execute a most
exquisite performance of "St. Patrick's Day in the Morning." Kathleen
trembled. Her eyes filled with tears. David was now whistling right into
her room "The Wearing of the Green." Kathleen flung down her pen, making
a splash on the paper.
"Go away," she called out. "What are you doing there?"
"The outside of this door doesn't belong to you," called David, "and if
I like to whistle through the keyhole you can't prevent me;" and he
began "Garry Owen" again.
Kathleen rushed to the door and flung it open. The tears were still wet
on her cheeks.
"Can't you guess what you are doing?" she said. "You are stabbing
me--stabbing me. Oh! oh! oh!" and she burst into violent sobs. David
took her hand.
"Come, little Irish colleen," he said. "Come along downstairs. I am
going to be chummy with you. Don't be so lonely. Give Alice her room;
one-half of it is hers, and she wants to dress to go out."
"Let her take it all," sobbed Kathleen. "I am most miserable. Oh, Garry
Owen, Garry Owen! Oh, Land of the Shamrock! Oh, my broken heart!"
She laid her head on David's shoulder and went on sobbing. David felt
quite bashful. There was nothing for it but to take out his big and not
too clean handkerchief and wipe her tears away.
"Whisper," he said in her ear. "There are stables at the back of the
house; they are old, worn-out stables. There is a loft over one, and I
keep apples and nuts there. It's the jolliest place. Will you and I go
there for an hour or two after supper?"
"Do you mean it?" said Kathleen, her eyes filling with laughter, and the
tears still wet on her cheeks.
"Yes, colleen, I mean it, for I want you to tell me all you can about
your land of the shamrock."
"Why, then, that I will," she replied. "Wisha, then, David, it's a broth
of a boy, you are!" and she kissed him on his forehead. David took her
hand and led her into the dining-room. Alice was still there, looking
more stormy than ever.
"It's too late now," she said; "the girls have come and gone. I can't go
at all now."
"But why, darling?" said Kathleen. "Oh! I wish I had let you in.--She
must go, David, the poor dear. It would be cruel to disappoint
her.--What dress will you wear?" said Kathleen.
"Let me alone," said Alice.
She rushed upstairs, but Kathleen was even quicker.
"I'm not going to be nasty to you any more," she said. "I have found a
friend, and I shall have more friends to-morrow. Kathleen O'Hara would
have died long ago but for her friends. I shall be happy when I have got
a creelful of them here. Now then, let me help you. No, that isn't the
shoe you want; here it is. And gloves--here's a pair, and they're neatly
mended. Which hat did you say--the one with the blue scarf round it?
Isn't it a pretty one? You put that on. Aunt Katie O'Flynn is going to
send me a box of clothes from Dublin, and I will give you some of them.
You mustn't say no; I will give you some if you are nice. I am ever so
sorry that I kept you out of your part of the room; I won't do it any
more. Now you are dressed; that's fine. You won't hate me forever, will
you?"
Alice growled something in reply. She had not Kathleen's passionate,
quick, impulsive nature--furious with rage one minute, sweet and gentle
and affectionate the next. She hated Kathleen for having humiliated and
annoyed her; and she went off to Cassandra's house knowing that she
would be late, and determined not to say one good word for Kathleen.