THE BLACK MONKS OF ASIA
"Who wants to go nutting?" demanded Grace Harlowe in the basement
cloakroom a few afternoons later.
"We do," came a chorus of voices.
"I don't," answered one.
"Don't you like nutting parties, Miriam?" asked Grace.
"She's too old," put in a sophomore. "This is a young people's party, I
presume?"
"Well, it's not a sophomore party, at any rate," retorted Nora.
"Ma-ma, ma-ma," cried a number of other sophomores, imitating the cries
of a baby.
The freshmen were nettled by the superior attitude of the older class,
but they knew better than to say anything more just then.
"Never mind, girls," said Grace in a low voice, after the sophomores had
strolled away, "we'll be sophomores ourselves next year. Now, all who
want to join the party, meet Nora and Jessica and me at the old Omnibus
House at three-thirty. And, above all, don't give the meeting place
away."
"Not in a thousand years," said Marian Barber.
It was evident that Miriam Nesbit had hoped to break up the party by
declining to go herself. But she was not quite strong enough in the
class to divide it utterly, and she went off in a huff, with the secret
wish to take revenge on somebody. As she started up Chapel Hill to her
home she was joined by one of the sophomore girls, who lived across the
street.
"Your plebes are getting away from you, Miriam," exclaimed the older
girl in a bantering tone. "You haven't got them well in hand yet.
Nutting parties should be left behind for the Grammar School pupils."
"They certainly should," replied Miriam in a disgusted tone. "It's Grace
Harlowe who gets up all these foolish children's games. She's nothing
but a tomboy, anyhow."
"She's the captain of the basketball team, isn't she?" asked the other
dryly.
"Yes," admitted Miriam reluctantly, "but she never would have been if
she hadn't brought along all her friends to vote for her."
"Whew-w-w!" whistled the sophomore. "You don't mean to say it wasn't a
fair election?"
"Oh, fair enough," said Miriam, "except that I didn't bother to bring
any of my special friends, and she did. I don't call that exactly fair."
"Oh, well," consoled the other, "you have a few things coming to you
anyway, Miriam. You're at the head of your class, as usual, I suppose?"
Miriam nodded her head without answering. She was thinking of little
Anne Pierson and what a close race they were running together. Even
studying harder than she had ever had to do before, Miriam found it
difficult to keep up with Anne.
"Where are they going?" asked the other girl suddenly, after they had
walked along a few minutes in silence.
"Where are who going?" asked Miriam.
"Why, the nutting party, of course."
Here was Miriam's chance for revenge. The sophomores were a famously
mischievous class, and this girl was one of its ringleaders. Back in
Grammar School days they had played many pranks on their school fellows,
and even in their freshman year they had dared to turn off all lights,
one night at a dance of older schoolmates.
"If I tell, you won't give me away, will you?" asked Miriam.
"I promise," said the older girl.
"Very well, then. They meet at three-thirty at the Omnibus House on the
River road."
"Good," said the sophomore. "Don't you want to come along and see the
fun?"
"Don't count on me," answered Miriam, turning in at her gate, with mixed
feelings of shame and triumph.
The Omnibus House, which had been chosen by Grace as the class meeting
place, was an old stone building standing in the middle of an orchard.
It was now in ruins, but tradition set it down as a former inn and stage
coach station built before the days of railroads, and finally burned by
the Indians. There was a curious hieroglyphic sign cut in a stone slab
in the front wall which one of the High School professors interested in
archæology had deciphered as follows: "Peace and Justice Reign Over
Mount Asia Tavern."
Here the crowd of High School "plebes," as the sophomores scornfully
dubbed them, met in conclave, partly to gather nuts in the woods near
by, partly to discuss class matters, but chiefly to enjoy the crisp
autumn weather. The woods were still gorgeous in russets and reds, in
spite of the recent heavy frosts, and there was a smell of burning
leaves and dry bracken in the air. The girls skipped about like young
ponies.
"If this is childish," cried Grace, "then I'd like to be a child always,
for I shall play in the woods when the notion strikes me, even if I'm a
grandmother."
There was a smothered snicker at this from the inside of the old stone
house, but the girls were too intent on their enjoyment to notice it.
"Young ladies," exclaimed Nora O'Malley, trailing her cape after her to
make her skirts look longer, and twisting her mouth down to give her
face a severe expression, "you are not in your usual form to-day. I must
ask for better preparation hereafter."
There was a peal of joyous laughter from the other girls.
"Miss Leece to a dot," cried Jessica.
"Miss Bright," went on Nora, "you will please pay attention to the
lesson. If you do not, young woman, I shall have to punish you in the
old-fashioned way."
"You will, will you?" cried Jessica, rushing gayly upon her friend.
"Come on and try it then!"
The other girls followed, and there was a tussle to pull Nora down from
the stone upon which she had clambered to protect herself.
Shrieks, struggles and wild laughter followed, while Nora fought
desperately to hold her position. So absorbed were they in friendly
battle that they had not noticed a troop of black-robed figures leaving
the ruined Omnibus House and stealthily approaching.
Nora was the first to see the ominous circle. She stopped short, and
pointed with unmistakable terror at the masked and hooded persons, who
were watching them silently. There was a moment of frozen horror when
the girls turned around. This was a lonely spot, too remote from any
dwelling to call for help. Besides, the freshmen were outnumbered by
these weird figures, who appeared not unlike monks in their somber
cowls, although their faces were absolutely hidden by black masks.
The girls clustered together around the rock like a group of frightened
chickens. Jessica had turned pale. She was not very robust and often
overtaxed her strength to keep up with her two devoted friends.
The tallest of the masked figures then spoke in a queer, deep voice.
"Young women, are you not aware that this is a sacred spot, devoted for
generations past to the Black Monks of Asia, whose home this building
was before it became a roadhouse for stage coaches? Never invade this
spot again with your hilarity. And now we will permit you to go,
marching out single file, without looking back. But first, through your
leader you must give your word never to mention this meeting to anyone.
If you refuse this promise we shall punish you as only the Black Monks
of Asia know how to punish persons who have offended the order. The
leader will please step forward."
There was a moment's whispered conversation among the freshmen. Then
Grace, urged by her friends, said:
"We promise."
"Now march out, single file, as agreed," resumed the Black Monk of Asia,
his voice trembling a little with suppressed emotion of some sort.
The girls started to move out of the enclosure single file, Grace
leading the procession, when a gust of wind blew the robe of the leading
monk apart, disclosing a navy blue serge walking-skirt. Grace's quick
eye caught sight of the skirt at once, and breaking from the line, she
charged straight into the group of black monks, crying:
"Sophomores! Sophomores!"
The other girls ran after her, screaming at the tops of their voices;
and there might have been almost a free fight between the two classes
had not the Black Monks of Asia scattered in every direction, running at
utmost speed.
"Come on back, girls," cried Grace in a disgusted tone.
She had chased a monk half-way across the orchard; then stopped to
wonder what she would do if she caught the tall, black-robed individual
who had indecorously caught up her skirts and was flying well ahead over
the rough ground.
One by one the plebes returned to their meeting place.
"Well, that was a sell!" uttered Nora disgustedly. "How shall we ever
manage to get even with those mean sophomores!"
"If we don't," exclaimed Grace, "we shall never hear the last of it in
Oakdale."
"But who gave us away?" demanded Jessica. "Did anyone drop a hint to the
sophomores of our secret meeting place?"
"I didn't," said one girl after another.
"Perhaps they followed us," suggested Marian Barber.
"No one followed me," asserted Grace. "I was careful to look behind and
see."
"Nor me."
"Nor me," exclaimed several of her classmates.
"No," said Nora. "Somebody must have overheard and given the secret
away."
"Not Mi----" but Grace stopped before she had finished the name.
The girls looked at each other.
Could Miriam Nesbit have been so false to her class?
No one replied, but each made a secret resolution to ferret out Miriam's
suspected treachery if it were the last act of her life.
"Let's start home, now," said Grace. "It's too late to go nutting
anyhow, and these foolish sophomores have spoiled the afternoon, for me
at least. If we don't cook up something to pay them back, the name of
freshman will be disgraced forever more."
However, the afternoon adventures were not at an end.
As the group of girls started toward the road, some distance away,
trying not to look crestfallen, a gruff voice from the far side of the
Omnibus House called:
"Hold up there!"
The girls took no notice, thinking it was more upper-class tricks.
Five rough-looking men emerged from a grove of alders which grew about
the building.
The young girls were really frightened this time. No sophomore could
disguise herself like this. These were undoubtedly genuine ruffians of
the worst type, hungry, blear-eyed and ragged.
"What shall we do?" whispered Jessica, clinging to Grace desperately.
"Everybody run," answered her friend, trying to be calm as the five men
advanced on them. But when they broke away to run toward the distant
road they found their retreat cut off by the tramps, who were active
enough as soon as the girls showed signs of flight. Back of them lay the
dense woods into which the sophomores must have plunged and departed for
town by another road. Seeing that escape was impossible, since, if some
got away, others would be caught--and no girl was willing to desert her
friends--the frightened plebes paused again and clustered about their
leader.
"What do you want?" asked Grace of one of the men.
"First your money, then your jewelry," answered the tramp, insolently
leering at her.
"But suppose we haven't any money or jewelry," replied Grace.
"So much the worse for you, then," answered the tramp in a threatening
tone.
"He can have this gold bracelet," exclaimed Jessica, slipping the band
from her arm.
But Grace was not listening. Her attention was absorbed by a group of
people passing in a straggling line on the road. Lifting up her voice
she gave the High School yell, which had been familiar to every High
School boy and girl for the last twenty years:
"Hi-hi-hi; hi-hi-hi; Oakdale, Oakdale, HIGH SCHOOL!"
As she expected, the call was answered immediately, and some of the
loiterers along the highway vaulted the fence at one bound.
"Help!" cried all the girls in chorus. "Help! Help!"
"It's some of the High School boys!" exclaimed Nora, in a relieved voice
as the rescuers came bounding through the orchard.
The tramps looked irresolute for a moment, but when they saw that the
newcomers were five boys they held their ground.
"What do you want?" said the tallest boy, with a flaming head of red
hair, as he confronted one of the tramps.
"Thank heaven it's Reddy Brooks, pitcher on the sophomore baseball
team!" whispered Grace, unable to conceal her joy.
"Is that any of your business, young man?" demanded the tramp, showing
his teeth like an angry dog.
"It's my business to protect these young ladies," answered Reddy Brooks,
"and I'll do it if I have to shed somebody's blood in the attempt."
"Ho, ho, ho!" laughed the big tramp, clapping his hands to his sides and
almost dancing a jig in his amusement.
In the meantime Reddy had cast his eyes about for some kind of a weapon.
There was not a stick nor stone in sight. The only thing he could find
was a pile of winter apples that had evidently been collected by the
owner of the orchard to be barreled next day.
Reddy made a rush for the pile, to the amazement of his fellow-students,
who imagined for a moment that he was running away. They soon found out
his purpose, however, when the apples came whizzing through the air with
well-aimed precision.
The first one hit the biggest tramp squarely on the chin and almost
stunned him. Each boy then chose his man and the five ruffians were soon
running across the orchard to the wood, the boys after them, their
pockets bulging with apples. Laughing and yelling like wild Indians,
they pelted their victims until the men disappeared in the forest.
The girls, who had forgotten their fright in the excitement of the
chase, were laughing, too, and urging on the attacks exactly as they
would have done at one of the college football games. Perhaps they had
had a narrow escape, but it was great fun, now, especially when Reddy
Brooks threw one of his famous curved balls and hit a tramp plump on the
back of the head.
"Oh," cried Nora, wiping tears of laughter from her eyes, "I never had
such a good time in all my life! Wasn't it great?"
"Wasn't it though?" grinned Reddy, as the boys returned from the field
of victory. "Lots more fun than throwing balls at dummies at the county
fair, wasn't it, fellows?"
"You girls ought to be careful how you walk out here alone at this time
of the year," said Jimmie Burke. "There are a great many tramps around
now, going south in bunches to spend the winter in Palm Beach, no
doubt."
"We'll never do it again," answered Grace.
"Never again!" exclaimed Nora, raising her right hand to heaven.
"I suppose Farmer Smithson will wonder what became of his apples,"
observed Reddy.
"Oh, well, he has so many acres of orchards, I don't suppose he'll miss
this one little pile."
And the crowd started gayly off to town.
But the girls of the freshman class had not forgotten--or forgiven--the
Black Monks of Asia.
All along the walk Grace was turning over and over in her mind some
scheme of revenge. Nothing seemed feasible, however. The sophomores were
so well up in tricks that it would be difficult to deceive them.
"Suppose," Grace proposed suddenly, aloud, "we ask David Nesbit's advice
to-morrow night, when we go to the flying machine exhibition."
After that she dismissed the subject from her mind for the time being.