MISS LEECE
Yes, there stood the hideous, grotesque effigy just where her abductors
had left her the night before, her green veil floating in the breezes.
As a figure of fun and an object of ridicule, she might not have created
more than a ripple with the faculty. But it was evident that Miss
Leece's function, even in effigy, was to make trouble.
And trouble was certainly brewing that memorable morning. The figure
itself might never have been recognized, but a placard which had been
pinned on the front of the old ulster left no room for doubt. Across it
had been inscribed in large printed letters:
"THE MOST UNPOPULAR TEACHER IN SCHOOL."
No one dared take the effigy away for fear of being implicated.
Everybody had seen it, both men and women professors and the boys and
girls of the two schools. But it was not until Miss Thompson, the
principal of the Girls' High School, had arrived that the figure was
removed.
"How could those boys have been so mean!" exclaimed Grace to her three
friends just before the gong sounded. "They might have known what would
happen."
There was an ominous quiet in the various class rooms all morning; but
nothing was said or done to indicate just when the storm would burst.
When the first class in algebra met, Anne trembled with fear, but Miss
Leece, in a robin's egg-blue dress, which offset the angry hue of her
complexion, was apparently too angry to trust herself to look in the
direction of the young girl and the lesson progressed without incident.
However, she was only biding her time.
"Miss Pierson," she said, toward the end of the lesson, in a voice so
rasping as to make the girls fairly shiver, "go to the blackboard and
demonstrate this problem."
Then she read aloud in the same disagreeable voice, the following
difficult problem:
"'Train A starts from Chicago going thirty miles an hour. An hour later
Train B starts from Chicago going thirty-five miles an hour. How far
from Chicago will they be when Train B passes Train A?'"
The girls looked up surprised. The problem was well in advance of what
they had been studying and Miss Leece was really asking Anne to recite
something she had not yet learned.
Anne hardly knew how to reply to the terrible woman who stood glowering
at her as if she would like to crush her to bits.
"I'm sorry," said the girl. "I cannot."
"Miss Nesbit," said the teacher, "will you demonstrate this problem?"
Miriam rose with a little smile of triumph on her face and went to the
blackboard, where she worked out the problem.
"Why, what on earth does the woman mean?" whispered Grace. "Are we
expected to learn lessons we have never been taught and has that horrid
Miriam been studying ahead?"
"I think I must be dreaming," replied Anne, looking sorrowfully at Miss
Leece.
"Miss Pierson," thundered the teacher, "you are aware, I believe, that I
permit no conversation in this class. Stupidity and inattention are not
to be supported in any student, and I must ask you to leave the room."
Anne rose in a dazed sort of way, looking very small and shabby as she
left the room.
But Miss Leece was not to come off so easily in the fight, and Anne had
a splendid champion in Grace Harlowe, who could not endure injustice and
was fearless where her rights or her friends' rights were concerned.
She rose quietly and faced the angry teacher, who already regretted
having gone so far.
"If Miss Pierson is to be ordered from the room, Miss Leece, I shall
follow her. I spoke to her first. I was naturally surprised that you
gave out a problem so far in advance of our regular work. It is doubtful
if any girl in the class could do it except Miriam, and she must have
been prepared."
"Miss Harlowe," said Miss Leece, stamping her foot, and again giving way
to rage, "I must ask you to take your seat at once and never interfere
again with the way I conduct this class."
"You conduct this class with injustice and violence, Miss Leece," said
Grace, turning very white, but holding herself in admirable control
considering the conduct of the older woman.
"I am in no humor to be answered back this morning, Miss Harlowe, and I
would advise you to be careful," continued the enraged woman. "I have
had enough to try me since last night and this morning. Miss Pierson
must answer to the principal for those insults, and her insubordination
just now has only made matters worse."
"Miss Pierson has nothing to answer for which I have not, and I shall
join her," replied Grace, and she left the room.
Miss Leece was about to continue the lesson when Jessica, pale and
trembling, rose and followed her friend. Nora was next to go and in
another moment there was not a girl left in the algebra class except
Miriam and her four particular friends. The gong sounded as the last
pupil closed the door behind her, but there was little doubt that the
first class in algebra had gone on a strike.
The noon recess gong had sounded before the girls were able to meet and
talk about the incident, and, during the time that intervened, Anne had
received a summons in the form of a small note to meet the principal in
her office at three that afternoon. She said nothing to her friends,
however, and hid the envelope in her pocket.
The girls in IV. algebra gathered around their friends to hear the
story. They were indignant and expressed their readiness to join the
strike out of sympathy in case there was any more trouble.
"They have no right to put such a violent woman over us," said Grace, as
she nibbled at a pickle and a cracker in the locker room. "I wish they
would give me the opportunity. I should be more than willing to testify
to her behavior before the entire faculty and the school board
combined."
Anne, herself, the center of the whole affair was very quiet. This
remarkable young girl seemed to possess some secret force that she was
able to draw upon when she most needed it.
"Anne, you precious child," exclaimed the impetuous Nora, "you must not
get scared. Whatever happens, the whole class means to stand by you.
Don't we, girls?"
"Yes," came from all sides.
"I don't think anything in particular will happen," replied Anne. "I
believe Miss Leece really wants to prevent my winning the prize. That's
all."
"She has certainly adopted a pet," cried Marian Barber.
"What did Miriam Nesbit mean by studying ahead like that?" exclaimed
another. "It was disloyal to the whole class."
"It looks very much as if they had fixed it up between them," continued
Grace. "I'm sorry about the effigy, but I won't stand that kind of
favoritism. It's mean and underhanded."
After school Anne lingered in the corridor until the other girls had
gone. Then she made her way slowly to the office of the principal. "Come
in," came the answer to her timid knock.
Miss Thompson, the principal, was a fine woman, much beloved by the
people of Oakdale where she had served as principal of the Girls' High
School for many years. She had adjusted numerous difficulties in her
time, but never such a knotty problem as the present one. It was
incredible that Anne Pierson, who stood so well in her classes that she
had already been mentioned by the faculty, should have engaged in such
an escapade as Miss Leece had accused her of.
"Sit down," she said kindly to the young girl, whose small, tired face
appealed to her sympathies. "What is this trouble between you and Miss
Leece, Miss Pierson?" she continued, plunging into the subject.
"I do not know myself, Miss Thompson," answered Anne quietly.
"But she accuses you of rather terrible things, Miss Pierson," went on
the principal, picking up a slip of paper and reading aloud,
"'inattention, insubordination, impertinence and a tendency to make
trouble.' Have you any answer to make to these charges?"
"No," replied Anne.
"Have you nothing to say?"
"Only that they are untrue."
"Miss Pierson," continued the principal, opening a closet door, "do you
recognize this figure."
[Illustration: "Miss Pierson, Do You Recognize This Figure?"]
There, hanging by its neck on a coat hook and still wearing its
fantastic bonnet and green veil, was the famous effigy.
Anne looked at the absurd thing for a moment in silence. Then her eyes
met Miss Thompson's, and both teacher and pupil burst out laughing.
The young girl never knew how far that laugh went to soften her present
predicament. As a matter of fact, Miss Thompson had never liked the
teacher in mathematics, while the small, shabby pupil appealed strongly
to her sympathy.
"Were you not the originator of this outrageous plot, Miss Pierson?"
Anne was silent. She could hardly say she was the originator and still
she had participated.
"I will put the question in another form," said the principal. "If you
were not the originator, who was?"
Still Anne made no reply.
"Miss Leece," continued the principal, "alleges that she distinctly saw
you standing by the figure. She did not recognize the other faces. Do
you think, Miss Pierson, that such an escapade as you engaged in last
night was entirely respectful or worthy of a pupil of Oakdale High
School?"
"No," replied Anne at last.
"Do you know that suspension or expulsion are the punishments for such
behavior?"
Anne clasped her hands nervously. She saw the freshman prize floating
away, and her eyes filled with tears, but she said nothing.
Instead of being angry, however, Miss Thompson was pleased with the
girl's pluck and loyalty. But she was puzzled to know how to proceed.
Her judgment and her sympathies revolted against punishing this prize
pupil, and still it looked as if Miss Leece had everything on her side.
A tap at the door interrupted her reflections, and Anne opened it,
admitting Mrs. Gray escorted by David and Grace.
"My dear Miss Thompson," said the old lady, "I know you will consider me
an interfering old woman, but when I heard that my particular child,
Anne Pierson, was in trouble, I came straight to you. I want to talk the
whole matter over comfortably; since it's my own freshman class that's
on the rampage, I feel as if I had a right to put in a word."
"You are most welcome, Mrs. Gray," replied Miss Thompson, cordially.
She was exceedingly fond of the lonely old lady who had been a
benefactor to the school in so many ways. "But what's this you say about
the freshman class? I have heard nothing about it."
"Grace," said Mrs. Gray, "suppose you tell Miss Thompson what you have
just finished telling me."
Then Grace related the incident in the algebra class and the long
succession of insults Anne had endured from the terrible Miss Leece.
"Dear, dear," murmured Miss Thompson, "this looks like persecution and
very strong favoritism on the part of Miss Leece. A thing we wish to
keep out of the school as much as possible. But what about this!" and
she opened the door of the closet where the pumpkin face of the effigy
grinned at them grotesquely from the shadows.
"I have something to say about that, Miss Thompson," declared David. "I
am the author of this 'crime' and I intend to take the blame for it.
Miss Pierson had so little to do with it that we had fairly to drag her
out of her own house to make her join the crowd."
"I think, Miss Thompson," put in Mrs. Gray, "that a teacher must have
been exceedingly sharp and disagreeable to have inspired such nice
children to this," and she pointed to the figure.
"I believe you are right," admitted the principal after a moment's
thought, "and I trust, under the circumstances, that the whole affair
can be settled without the interference of the School Board. Suppose you
leave Miss Leece to me. And young people," she added, "if you will
promise to say nothing more about the subject, I think Miss Leece may be
persuaded to let the matter drop."
And so ended the Hallowe'en escapade. Miss Thompson paid a visit to Miss
Leece that evening, at the teacher's rooms in Oakdale, and was closeted
with her for more than an hour. No one ever knew what happened. Miss
Thompson was a woman to keep her own counsel; but the affair never came
up before the School Board and Miss Leece, after that, though somewhat
stiff in her manner, had no more outbursts of rage for some time.
Undoubtedly her display of favoritism in the algebra class had lost her
the day.
Miss Thompson was a woman of fine judgment and broad and just views. She
was proud of the Oakdale High Schools and the splendid classes they
turned out year after year. She realized perfectly what a disturbance a
woman like Miss Leece could cause and she determined to check her at
every point, especially when the most prominent and finest pupils of the
two schools were implicated.
Therefore the offenders went scot-free and Anne was once more safe to
pursue the freshman prize.
Miss Leece, however, was only biding her time. While Anne had won this
battle she might lose the next.