KATHLEEN HAS A GOOD TIME IN LONDON.
So the head-mistress had written; she had dared to write to Kathleen's
father. What she said to him was a matter of no moment; she had written,
and to complain of her!
"She thinks, I suppose," said Kathleen, "that she'll subdue me by these
means. She wants to bring, not the long arm of the law, but father's arm
right across the sea to stop me. No, no, daddy, your Kathleen will be
your Kathleen to the end--always loving, always daring, always true,
but always rebellious; the best and the worst. I am going to-night, and
I am going all the more surely because you wired to me not to go, and
because they are daring to bully dear little Ruth Craven. And after I
have had my fling I will come back in good time. No fear; nothing will
go wrong. Your Kathleen wouldn't hurt a fly, much less your heart. But I
mean to have my fun to-night."
Kathleen quite sobered down as these thoughts came to her. It was now
getting dusk. The girls were to meet at the station at half-past five.
They were to go in quite quietly by twos and twos; each couple of girls
was to go to the booking-office and take their tickets, and walk away
just as though nothing special had happened. They were on no account to
collect in a mass. They were not even to take any notice of each other
until they were off. Once the train was in motion all would be safe;
they might meet then and talk and be merry to their hearts' content. Oh,
it was a good, good time they were about to have!
This arrangement about meeting one another had been suggested by Kate
Rourke, who knew a good deal about theatres, and who also knew how
dangerous it would be for so many girls to be seen at the station
together; but dressed quietly, and just dropping in by couples, nobody
would remark them.
"And then we must go straight to the theatre," she said, "and stand
outside the pit, and take our chance; but we will have time enough for
that if we leave Merrifield by the quarter-to-six train."
Kathleen noticed that evening that Alice watched her as she moved about
the room; that Alice occasionally lifted her eyes and glanced at her
when she sat down to read; and when she approached the tea-table and
helped herself to tea and bread-and-butter and jam, Alice also kept up
that gentle sort of espionage. It annoyed Kathleen; she found herself
watching for it. She found herself getting red and annoyed when the
calm, steadfast gaze of Alice's brown eyes was fixed on her face.
Finally she said:
"What are you doing? Why do you stare at me?"
"Sorry," replied Alice. She bent over her book, and did not glance again
at Kathleen.
By-and-by Kathleen went upstairs. She went to their mutual room, and
turned the key in the lock.
"I must get out of the window," she said to herself. "I can easily do
it; it is but to swing on to that thick cord of ivy and I shall reach
the ground without the slightest trouble. The back-gate that leads into
the garden is never locked, and the window I mean to emerge from looks
into the garden. I shall go off without anybody's noticing me."
Kathleen had to take a great deal of money with her. If there were forty
girls, their tickets would cost a good deal. It is true they were to buy
their own in the first instance, but Kathleen was to return them the
money in the train. Then the omnibuses they were to go on, the seats at
the theatre, their supper of some sort must be paid for by the head of
the society.
"I promised to frank them, and I must frank them," thought the girl.
She slipped some sovereigns into her purse, tucked it for safety into
the bosom of her dress, and then put on her hat and jacket. Some
instinct told the wild, ignorant child to dress quietly. She put on her
plainest hat and a little reefer coat which looked neat and substantial.
She was just drawing a pair of gloves on her hands when Alice was heard
turning the handle of the door.
"Let me in at once, Kathleen," she cried.
Kathleen did not reply at all for a moment; then she said in a sleepy,
smothered sort of voice which seemed to proceed from the bed:
"I have a splitting headache; don't disturb me."
"Very sorry," answered Alice, "but I really must come in."
Kathleen made no answer. After a long pause, during which Alice once or
twice felt the handle of the door again, the sound of her retreating
footsteps was heard.
"Now is my time," thought Kathleen.
To tell the truth, Alice was not at all taken in by Kathleen's headache.
"She is very clever," thought that young lady, "but she has tried that
dodge on so often before that I am not going to be deceived by it now."
Accordingly she went into her mother's room and stood by the window. Now
the window of Mrs. Tennant's bedroom looked also into the garden, and
was really parallel with the window by which Kathleen meant to escape.
There was an interval of silence, and then Alice had her reward! for the
window of their mutual bedroom was flung wide open, and Kathleen, neatly
dressed, appeared on the window-sill. She looked around her for a minute.
Alice caught a glimpse of her bright face by the light of the moon,
which was already getting up in the sky. The next minute Kathleen caught
firm hold of the arm of old ivy and let herself down deftly and quickly
to the ground. The action was done so neatly, and in fact so
beautifully, that Alice in spite of herself felt inclined to cry
"Bravo!" She knew that if she were to trust herself to that ivy she
would probably fall to the bottom and get, if not really killed, at
least half so. But Kathleen stood serenely on the ground, and glanced
up at the window from which she had let herself down. Just at that
moment Alice rushed into their bedroom. Kathleen had shut the window
behind her before she trusted herself to the ivy; she had also unlocked
the door. In a moment Alice had put on her hat and jacket, had rushed
downstairs, opened the hall door, and was following Kathleen across the
common. Now, quite the nearest way to the railway station was across the
common. Kathleen walked fast.
"Kathleen, Kathleen!" cried Alice.
Kathleen looked behind her. She saw Alice, and took to her heels.
"No, no, Kathleen; I will follow you until I drop. You must let me come
up with you."
But Kathleen made no answer. If she could do anything well, she could
run in a race. Her swift feet scarcely touched the ground. She ran and
ran. How soon would Alice get tired? She did not dare to go to the
railway station as long as she was following. And the time to catch the
train was very short. At the other side of the common was a long,
narrow, winding passage which, after a quarter of a mile of tortuous
turning, led right up a back-way to the great terminus. Kathleen had
given herself exactly the right length of time. Had nothing happened to
hinder her, she would have been on the platform three minutes before the
train came in. For reasons of her own she did not wish to be long there.
She had crossed the common when she looked behind her; Alice was still
running, but she was also in the distance.
"If I could only double, hide for a minute, and make her give up the
chase, all would be well," thought the mischievous Irish girl.
There was a great tree, which cast a huge shadow, just before the
winding passage was reached. Kathleen darted towards it. In an instant
she had climbed up and was seated securely in one of its lower branches.
"Now, if only she will be quick, she will run past me into the passage.
She will never get to the end in time. I shall slip down and go the long
way. I know it is a good bit farther, but she is not in it with me as
far as running is concerned," was Kathleen's thought.
Alice came up as far as the tree; she paused a minute and looked around
her. Kathleen in the gray darkness looked down at her. Kathleen's face
was completely in the shadow, but the light fell full on Alice's, and
her face, white and anxious, almost made the other girl laugh.
"If the situation wasn't quite so tremendous I could enjoy this," she
thought.
Presently Alice ran down the passage. Kathleen waited until her
footsteps had died away, and then she descended from the oak-tree. She
flew as fast as she could the long way to the railway station.
"Alice can't think that I want to go by train," thought Kathleen.
Now she was truly a very swift runner, but as she was running to-night,
whom should she meet but Mrs. Hopkins. Mrs. Hopkins was on her way home
after doing a little shopping on her own account. She saw Kathleen,
observed her panting for breath, and stood directly in her path.
"Miss O'Hara," she said, "can I speak to you for a moment? It is
something very particular indeed. I am very thankful I happened to meet
you."
"I will see you to-morrow--to-morrow," panted Kathleen. "I am in a great
hurry. To-morrow, Mrs. Hopkins."
"No, Miss O'Hara; it ought to be to-night. You are going to the railway
station, aren't you, miss?"
Kathleen felt inclined to knock that interfering woman down. She darted
to one side of the road.
"Oh, let me pass!" she said. She was shaking with her quick run. She
knew the moments were flying; already she heard the bell at the station
ring. The train for London was signaled; she had not an instant to lose.
"Don't--don't keep me," she said.
"But you mustn't go, miss; it would be madness--wicked. You musn't; you
daren't."
Kathleen pushed past her. This time Mrs. Hopkins had no power to stop
her. She rushed on, reached the station, flew up the steps, and found
herself on the platform just as the train was coming in.
Instead of the forty girls she expected to meet, she saw not more than
about half-a-dozen. They all crowded up to her at once.
"I have got your ticket for you," said Susy. "I was just able to screw
out the money to get one for you and myself. Here's the train; let us
hop in at once."
"But where are all the others--the forty?" gasped Kathleen.
"They funked it, almost all of them. Oh! come along; here's the train."
The great train thundered into the station. The girls ran wildly looking
for a third-class carriage. At last they found one and tumbled into it;
the door was slammed, and they were off. Kathleen wondered--she was not
sure, but she wondered--if she really did see, or if it was only a
dream, a pair of brown eyes looking at her from the station, and the
severe young figure and shocked face of Alice Tennant.
"It must have been a dream; she could not have guessed that I was going
to the station. What a good thing she didn't meet Mrs. Hopkins!" thought
Kathleen. Then she turned to her companions--to the six girls who had
decided to brave all the terrors of their expedition. They were Susy
Hopkins, Kate Rourke, Clara Sawyer, Rosy Myers, Janey Ford, and Mary
Wilkins.
Kathleen sat quite still for a minute until she had recovered her
breath. She looked around her. To her relief, she saw that they were
alone. There was no one else in the compartment.
"Now then," she said, "how is it that all the others have funked it?"
"There has been so much muttering and whispering and suspecting going on
during the whole livelong day that they were positively afraid," said
Susy. "Indeed, if it hadn't been for you, Kathleen, I doubt if any of us
would have come."
"Well, girls, we can't help it," said Kathleen. "If the rest are so
timid, there's more fun for us; isn't that so?"
She looked round at her companions.
"I mean to enjoy myself," said Kate Rourke. "I have been to a theater
twice before. Once I went with my grandfather, and another time with an
uncle from Australia. I didn't go to the pit when I went with uncle. He
took me to a grand stall, and we rubbed up against the nobility, I can
tell you."
It suddenly occurred to Kathleen that Kate Rourke was rather a vulgar
girl. She drew a little nearer to her, however, and fixed her very
bright eyes on the girl's face."
"But we needn't go to the pit, need we?" she said. "I meant to pay for
forty. If there are only six, why shouldn't we have jolly seats
somewhere, and not waste our time outside the theater?"
"That would be nice," said Kate Rourke. "I always enjoy myself so much
more if I am in good company. I have been looking up the plays at the
theaters, and there is a very fine piece on at the Princess'. That is in
Oxford Street. It is a sort of melodrama; there's a deal of killing in
it, and the heroine has to do some desperate deeds."
"Oh, dear!" said Susy, with a sigh; "I don't feel, somehow, as if I much
cared where we went. It will be awful afterwards when the fun is over."
"But we will enjoy ourselves, Susy, while the fun lasts," said Kathleen.
She tried to believe that she was enjoying herself and was having a
right good time. She tried to forget the fact that Alice Tennant might
really have seen her off, and that Mrs. Hopkins had justice in her
remarks when she begged and implored of Kathleen not to go to the train.
"What can she have found out?" she thought.
She now turned to Susy.
"Has your mother learned anything, Susy?" she said.
"What do you mean?" said Susy, turning very pink.
"Well, you know, as I was running here--Oh, girls, I had such a lark!
What do you think happened? That horrid Alice--Alice Tennant--ran after
me as I was leaving the house. I raced her across the common, and then
to get rid of her I climbed up into an oak-tree. She never saw me, and
ran on down the passage. Of course, my only chance of getting to the
station was to go by the long way.--Half-way there I came across your
mother, Susy, and she tried to stop me, and said she must speak to me.
Dear, she did seem in a state! Evidently there's a great deal of
excitement and watching going on in that school."
"There will be a great deal of excitement to-morrow," said Susy. "It
strikes me it will be all up with us to-morrow--that is, if Ruth tells."
"If Ruth tells! What do you mean?"
"They are going to do their utmost to get her to tell; and if she does
tell they will call out our names and expel us, that's all. Oh! I can't
bear to think of it--I can't bear to think of it."
Susy's voice broke. Tears trembled in her bright black eyes, and she
turned her head to one side. Kathleen gave her a quick glance.
"It will be all right," she said. "Ruth won't tell. Ruth is the kind who
never tells. She told me to-day she wouldn't."
"She'll be a brick if she doesn't," said Kate Rourke. "But then, of
course, you know--"
"I know what?"
"Oh, nothing. What's the good of making ourselves melancholy on a night
like this?"
"If I were expelled," said Clara Sawyer, "I should leave Merrifield. I
could never lift up my head again. You can't think what impudent sort of
boys my brothers are, and they have always twitted me for my good
fortune in getting into the Great Shirley School. They say that if we
are to be expelled it will be done in public. The governors are
determined to read us a lesson. That's what they say."
"Who cares what they say?" said Kathleen. "Let them say."
"Well, that's what I think; and I dare say half of it is untrue," said
little Janey Ford.
"I am sure, Janey, wonders will never cease when we see you in this
thing," said Susy. "It was disgusting of the others to funk it. But I
suppose they were on the right side; only I do sometimes hate being on
the right side.--Don't you, Kathleen?"
"Yes," said Kathleen in a whisper, and she squeezed Susy's hand. It
seemed to her that her soul and Susy's had met at that moment, and had
saluted each other like comrades true.
"But how was it you came, Janey? Didn't your little heart funk it
altogether?" continued Kate.
"I was so mad to come," said Janey. "I am shaking and trembling now like
anything. But I had never been to a theater, and it was such a
tremendous temptation. I said about ten times to myself that I wouldn't
come, but eleven times I said that I would; and the eleventh time
conquered, and here I am. I do hope we'll have a right good time."
With this sort of chatter the girls got to London. Here Kate Rourke took
the lead. She marshaled the little party in two and two, and so conveyed
them out of the station. Outside the yard at Charing Cross they all
climbed on the top of an omnibus, and soon were wending their way in the
direction of the Princess' Theater, which Kate most strongly advocated.
There was no crowd at the theater this special evening. The piece which
was presented on the boards happened to be a fairly good one. The girls
got excellent seats, and found themselves in the front row of the family
circle. From there they could look down on dazzling scenes, and
Kathleen, who had never been to a theater in the whole course of her
life, was delighted. She at least had forgotten what might follow this
expedition. Oh, yes, they were having a glorious time; and it was quite
right to do what you liked sometimes, and quite right to defy your
elders. Oh, how many she was defying: Ruth Craven, who would almost
have given her life to keep her back from this; Miss Ravenscroft, the
head-mistress, to whom Kathleen's heart did not go out; her own father;
her own aunt; Alice Tennant--oh, bother Alice Tennant! And last, Mrs.
Hopkins.
"Quite an army of them," thought Kathleen. "I have dared to do what none
of them approved of, and I am not a bit the worse for it. Darling dad,
your own Kathleen will tell you everything, and you may give me what
punishment you think best when the fun is over. But now I am having a
jolly time."
So Kathleen did enjoy herself, and made so many saucy remarks between
the acts, and looked so radiant notwithstanding her very plain dress,
that several people looked at the beautiful girl and commented about her
and her companions.
"A school party, my dear," said a lady to her husband.
"But I don't see the chaperone," he remarked.
And then the lady, who looked again more carefully, could not help
observing that these seven girls were certainly not chaperoned by any
one. A little wonder and a little uneasiness came into her heart. She
was a very kind woman herself; she was a motherly woman, too, and she
thought of her own girls tucked up safely in bed at home, and wondered
what she would feel if they were alone at a London theater at this hour.
Presently something impelled her to bend forward and touch Kathleen on
her arm. Kathleen gave a little start and faced her.
"Forgive me," she said; "I see that you and your companions are
schoolgirls, are you not?"
To some people Kathleen might have answered, "That is our own affair,
not yours;" but to this lady with the courteous face and the gentle
voice she replied in quite a humble tone:
"Yes, madam, we are schoolgirls."
"And if you will forgive me, dear, have you no lady looking after you?"
"No," said Kate Rourke, bending forward at that moment; "we are out for
a spree all by our lone selves."
Kate gave a loud laugh as she spoke. The lady started back, and could
not help contrasting Kathleen's face with those of the other girls. She
bent towards her husband and whispered in his ear. The result of this
communication was that, the curtain having fallen for the last time, the
actors having left the stage, the play being completely over, and the
seven girls being about to get back to Charing Cross as best they could,
the lady touched Kathleen on her arm.
"You will forgive me, dear," she said; "I am a mother and have daughters
of my own. I should not like to see girls in the position you are in
without offering to help them."
"But what do you mean?" said Kathleen.
"I mean this, my dear, that my husband and I will see you seven back to
your home, wherever it is."
Kathleen burst out laughing; then she looked very grave, and her eyes
filled with tears as she said:
"But wouldn't mother approve of it?"
"If your mother is the least like me she would not approve of it; she
would be horrified."
"I don't think the lady can see us home," here remarked Clara Sawyer,
"for we live at Merrifield, a good long way from London."
Again the lady and her husband had a talk together, and then she
suggested that they should take the girls back with them to Charing
Cross and put them into their train.
"But we thought we'd have a bit of supper," said Kate Rourke.
"I can get you some things at the railway station; you ought not to wait
for supper in town," said the gentleman in a stern voice.
Then somehow all the girls felt ashamed of themselves, Kathleen slightly
more ashamed than the others. They left the theater very slowly, with
all the lightsomeness and gladness of heart gone.
Two cabs were secured for the little party, and with their kind
protectors they were taken back to Charing Cross. Eventually they got
seats in a comfortable carriage, and found themselves going back again
to Merrifield.
"Well, it has been a dull sort of thing altogether," said Clara Sawyer.
"What meddlesome people!"
"Don't!" said Kathleen.
"Don't what, Kathleen O'Hara? Why should you speak to me in that
reproving voice?"
"It isn't that; only they were like two angels. I know it; I am sure of
it. We did an awful thing coming to town; I know we did, and I feel--oh,
detestable!"
Kathleen bent her head forward, covered it with her hands, and sat
still. No tears shook her little frame, but there was a storm within. To
her dying day Kathleen never forgot that return journey. Truly the fun
was all over; the dregs of the cup of pleasure were in their mouths, and
there was a fear, great, certain, and very terrible, in their hearts.
But with all her fears--and they were many--Kathleen thought again and
again of the lady who had girls of her own, and of the gentleman who was
both stern and chivalrous, who had the manners of a prince and the look
of a gentleman. As long as she lived she remembered those two faces, and
the words of the lady, and the smile with which she said good-bye. She
never learned their names; perhaps she did not want to.