FACING THE ENEMY.
It was a joyous day when Judy returned to college just before mid-years,
after her long exile in the back room of O'Reilly's. She was made
welcome by all her particular friends who killed the "potted" calf, as
Edith called it, in honor of the prodigal's return.
And Judy was well content with herself and all the world. A hair-dresser
in Wellington had, by some mysterious process, restored her hair to very
nearly its natural shade. Thanks to Molly, chiefly, and the others, she
was well up in her lessons and quite prepared to breast the mid-year
wave of examinations with the class. Never had the three friends at No.
5 been more gloriously, radiantly happy than now on the verge of final
examinations. And then one day, in the midst of all this serenity and
peace, Adele Windsor dropped in to call on Judy. At once Nance fled from
the apartment. She could not bear the sight of this sinister young
woman. Molly would have gone, too, but she remained, at an imploring
glance from Judy, and slipped quietly into the next room, leaving the
door ajar.
"Judy knows she can call for help if she needs it," she thought rather
complacently, for she was no longer afraid of that arch mischief-maker.
As for Judy, she was singularly polite, but cold in her manner, and
Molly detected a certain tremulousness in her voice.
"She's scared, poor dear," thought Molly indignantly. "Now, I wonder
why?"
"I haven't seen you for weeks," Adele began in her sharp, assured tone.
"Where have you been? I heard you had gone home."
"I was away for some time," answered Judy evasively.
"I hope and trust she thinks I have gone out with Nance," thought Molly
in the next room, feeling a good deal like a conspirator. "She'll never
come to the point if she knows I'm here, and I'd just like her to show
her cards for once. It will be a glorious chance to get rid of her
forever more, amen."
The light of battle came into Molly's eyes. "I feel like a knight
pricking o'er the plain to slay a dragon," she thought, waving an
imaginary sword in the air. "When it's all over I wish I had the nerve
to say, 'Thou wretched, rash, intruding fool, farewell.'"
She gathered that Adele had moved more closely to Judy, for she heard
her voice from a new quarter of the room saying:
"Is it true that you were dropped?"
There was a moment's pause.
"Whatever happened, Adele, it's over now and I am installed again and
forgiven."
"I thought you were being rather reckless, Judy. The rope ladder
business was bad enough, but those ghost walks were really dangerous;
really you went too far----"
"I beg your pardon," interrupted Judy stiffly. "You are on the wrong
track. I wasn't the campus ghost."
"Now, really, Judy, my dearest friend," cried Adele, seizing both of
Judy's hands and looking into her eyes with an expression of gentle
toleration, "why can't you confide in me? After all our good times are
you going to give me the cold shoulder? I know perfectly well that you
were the ghost. Have I forgotten the night you planned the whole thing
out? Anne White was there. I daresay she remembers it quite as well as I
do. Of course, we thought you were enjoying yourself frightening the
life out of people, but we wondered, both of us, how you dared. I
remember you said how easy it would be to chase girls if they ran, and
how easy to escape because you were the swiftest runner in college. Why
are you trying to deceive your old partner? Especially as I happen to
know that you had the rope ladder all that time. It would have been easy
enough. Oh, I'm on to you, subtle, secretive Judy. You are a clever
little girl, but I'm on to you."
"What does she want?" Molly breathed to herself in the next room.
"But I won't tease you any longer, dearest. I only wanted to let you
know that I'm at the very bottom of the secret. I came to talk about
other things."
Molly breathed a long sigh.
"Here it comes," she thought.
Judy straightened up and prepared to hear the worst.
"Have the Shakespeareans and the Olla Podridas had their yearly conclave
yet about new members?"
"So it's that," Molly almost cried aloud, waving her arms over her
head.
"We meet on Saturday," answered Judy doggedly.
"You have a good deal of influence in that crowd, haven't you? I mean
you can command a lot of votes?"
"No, I can't command any," answered Judy.
"Blackmailer," thought Molly.
"I was thinking," went on Adele calmly, "that I would like to become a
member of one or both those clubs. If I have to make a choice I would
prefer the Shakespeareans, of course. Can't you fix it up?"
"I'm afraid not, Adele. I can't manage it. I doubt if I could command
any votes for you. You are mistaken about my influence."
"Oh yes, you can. Now, Judy, think a minute, I'm asking you a very
simple, ordinary favor. Think of what it means to me and--well, to you,
too. I might as well tell you right now that I'm a good friend but a bad
enemy. You promised me once to get me into one of those clubs. Do you
remember?"
"Yes," said Judy.
"Well, why this sudden change? I expect you to keep your word. I am wild
to be a member of the Shakespeareans," here Adele changed her manner and
her voice took on a soft, persuasive tone. "You won't regret it, Judy,
dearest, you'll be proud of having put me up. I have a real talent for
acting. I have, indeed, and I shall be able to get stunning costumes."
Judy twisted and squirmed and shrunk away like a bird being gradually
hypnotized by a serpent--at least so it seemed to Molly peeping through
a crack in the door.
"I tell you it will be impossible," Judy was saying, after a pause, when
Adele burst out with:
"Those are unlucky words, Judy Kean. I'll make you sorry you ever
spoke----" she stopped short off as Molly appeared in one door and Nance
in the other, followed by Otoyo, Margaret and Jessie and the Williams
sisters. Nance had evidently gone forth and gathered in the clan for
Judy's protection. Molly was almost sorry they had come. It had been a
good opportunity to say what had been seething in her mind for some
time, and, on the whole, she decided she would say it anyhow.
With a bold spirit and a scornful eye, she marched into the room and
stood before the astonished Adele.
"Miss Windsor," she said, and she hardly recognized her own voice, so
deep and vibrant were its tones, "did you ever hear of snakey-noodles?
Snakey-noodles! snakey-noodles! snakey-noodles!" she repeated three
times like a magic incantation.
Judy must have thought that she had suddenly lost her mind, for she
glanced at her with a frightened look and the other girls with
difficulty concealed their smiles. Edith, whose keen perceptions at once
informed her that something was up, took a seat by the window where she
could command a good view of the entire proceedings.
Adele, looking into Molly's honest, stern eyes, shrank a little and
started to rise.
"No, I shan't let you go until I have finished," said Molly. "Whenever
the spirit moves you to ask a favor of Judy again, just say the word
snakey-noodles over several times to yourself and then I think you'll
leave Judy alone. Now, you may go, and remember that people who tell
malicious, wicked stories, who impersonate ghosts, steal luncheons and
get other girls into trouble are not welcome at Wellington. This is not
that kind of a college."
It was, of course, a random shot about the campus ghost, but Molly put
it in, feeling fairly certain that none but the daring Adele would have
attempted that escapade.
"Remember, too," she added, as a parting shot, "that girls don't get
into clubs here by blackmail. Even if Judy had put you up, you wouldn't
have had the ghost of a chance."
Nobody was more interested than Edith in wondering what the strange
Adele would do now. "Will she defend herself or will she fly?" Edith
asked herself. But Adele did the most surprising thing yet. She burst
into tears.
"You have no right to speak to me as you did," she wept into a scented
and hand-embroidered handkerchief.
"Haven't I?" said Molly, drawing her gently but firmly to the door.
"Well, go to your room and think about it a while and see if you don't
change your mind." And with that she quietly thrust Adele into the hall,
closed the door and locked it.
Then, such a burst of subdued laughter rose within No. 5 as was never
heard before. Molly collapsed on the sofa while the girls gathered
around her. Judy sat on the floor, her head resting on Molly's shoulder.
"It was as good as a play," cried Edith. "I never saw anything finer.
Molly, you're certainly full of surprises. But what did you mean by
snakey-noodles? Wasn't it beautiful?"
Then Molly explained to them about the snakey-noodle box.
"Of course, the rest was just wild guessing, but from the way she took
it I'm pretty sure I'm right."
"It was better than jiu-jitsu," said Otoyo. "It was, I think, the
jiu-jitsu of language."
They all laughed at this quaint notion, and Molly relaxed on the couch
like a very tired young warrior after the battle.
"Judy, you're foolish to be afraid of that girl," said Margaret sternly.
"I'm not exactly afraid of her," answered Judy, "but you see it would
have gone particularly hard with me just now to have her go to Miss
Walker with that story about the ghost. It was true that one evening, in
a wicked humor, I planned the whole thing with her and that little Anne
who is just as afraid of her as I suppose I am. I don't think Miss
Walker would have given me another chance. Everything would have been
against me, the rope ladder and all the things I had said."
"But then you could have proved an alibi," said Nance. "You were up here
the night the ghost chased Molly and me."
"So I could," Judy exclaimed. "I was so scared I forgot all about that
night. There's something about Adele that makes you lose your senses.
She leans over you and looks at you and talks to you in a hot, rapid
sort of way. I just saw myself, after all the trouble everybody had
taken with me, being sent away in disgrace. I didn't believe I could
prove anything when she began talking. I just went under."
"Well, don't you ever do it again," put in Nance.
"Say 'snakey-noodles' the next time she comes at you," said Edith. "Oh,
dear, that exquisite name," she continued, leaning back in her chair so
as to indulge in a fit of silent laughter.
"I can tell you another interesting bit about this Miss Windsor," here
put in pretty Jessie. "Do you remember that shabby little woman in black
who came down on the same train with Molly's Mr. Lufton?"
"Nonsense," broke in Molly.
"I remember her," said Judy. "Adele said she was a dressmaker, I
believe."
"Well, she told the truth for once. She is a dressmaker, but she happens
to be Adele's mother, too."
"Her mother," they gasped in chorus.
"Yes. When Mama and I were in New York for the Christmas holidays, we
were recommended to go to a French place called 'Annette's' for some
clothes. There was a French woman named Annette who came out and showed
us things, but the head of the establishment was Mrs. Windsor. And we
saw Adele hanging around several times. We also saw Adele's father, very
dressy with a flower in his buttonhole and yellow gloves. He smiled
sweetly at me in the hall. The fitter told us secretly that Mrs.
Windsor spent everything she made on Adele and Mr. Windsor."
"What a shame," cried Judy, "and Adele throws money around like water."
"No wonder she wears such fine clothes. I suppose Annette makes all of
them."
"Thank heavens, we're rid of her forever," exclaimed Molly. "It's not
difficult to find a spot of good in the worst of people. There were
Minerva Higgins and Judith Blount and Frances Andrews. I never did feel
hopeless about them, but this Adele, who doesn't recognize her own
mother--well----"
"Ah, well," broke in Otoyo. "She is what we call in Japan 'evil spirit,'
or 'black spirit.' She will not remain because there are so many good
spirits. She will fly away."
"On a broomstick," put in Edith.
"But Minerva Higgins, there is some greatly big news about her. You have
not heard?"
"No," they cried. Otoyo had become quite a little news body among her
friends.
"She will not finish the course. She will be married in June to learned
gentleman, a professor of languages of death----"
"You mean dead languages," put in Molly, laughing.
"Ah, well, it is the same."
"That is why Minerva looks so gay and blushing," said Jessie. "I saw her
this morning reading a letter on one of the corridor benches. I might
have guessed it was a love letter from her expression of supreme joy."
"I wonder if it was written in Sanskrit."
"I suppose after they marry they will have Latin for breakfast, Greek
for dinner and ancient Hebrew for supper," observed Katherine.
"But the gold medals, what of them?"
"They will be saved for Pallas Athene, and Socrates, and Alcibiades
Plato, of course," said Edith.
"Who are they?"
"Why, the children, goosie," and the party broke up with a laugh.