TRIUMPHS AND TROUBLES
"Aren't you going to have any breakfast, Betty?" Helen Chase Adams coming
up from her own hasty Monday morning repast, paused in the door to stare
at her roommate, who stood in a cleared space in the middle of the floor
with diaphanous clouds of beflowered dimity floating about her feet.
"Breakfast!" repeated Betty, mournfully. "It just struck eight, didn't
it? I don't know how I'm going to have any now unless I cut chapel and go
down town for it. On Mondays I have classes all the morning long, and I
haven't half studied anything either, because of that hateful May party."
"Then why did you begin on your dress?" inquired Helen with annoying
acuteness.
"Helen," said Betty, tragically, "I haven't a single muslin to my name,
since I tore my new one and the laundry tore my old one, and I thought if
I could only get this hung then I could be putting in the tucks at odd
minutes, when people come in, you know. I didn't think it would take a
minute and I've been half an hour just looking at it."
"Isn't it rather long?" asked Helen, with a critical glance at the filmy
pile on the floor.
"Why, that's the tucks," explained Betty, impatiently. "And the only
reason I had tucks instead of ruffles was because I thought they'd be
easier. Shouldn't you have thought tucks would be easier, Helen?"
"I shouldn't have known."
"Well, I guess they're both bad enough," agreed Betty, gloomily. "I was
foolish to try to make a dress, but I thought if Nita and the B's could,
I could. The waist wasn't any trouble, because Emily Davis helped me, but
it isn't much use without a skirt."
"Let me know if I can do anything," said Helen, politely, opening the
volume of Elizabethan lyrics which had succeeded "The Canterbury Tales"
as pabulum for the class in English Literature II.
Betty kicked at the enveloping cloud savagely. "If only it would stay
down somewhere, so I could tell where the bottom ought to be." She gave a
little cry of triumph,--"I have it!" and reaching over to her bookshelves
she began dropping books in an even circle around her feet. An instant
later there was a crash and the thud of falling books.
"There!" said Betty, resignedly. "That bookcase has come to pieces again.
It's as toppley on its legs as a ten-cent doll. Never mind, Helen. I can
reach them beautifully now and I will truly pick them all up afterward."
She dropped a Solid Geometry beside a "Greene's History of the English
People," and stooped gingerly down to move "Alice in Wonderland" a trifle
to one side, so that it should close the circle.
Then she looked doubtfully at Helen, who was again deep in her lyrics.
"Helen," she said at last, "would you mind awfully if I asked you to put
in some pins for me? If I stoop down to put them in myself, the books
move and I can't tell where the pins ought to go."
Helen had just put in the last pin with painful deliberation, and was
crawling around her necessarily immovable model to see that she had made
no mistakes, when the door opened with a flourish and Mary Brooks
appeared.
"What in the world!" she began, blinking near-sightedly at Betty in her
circle of books, at the ruins of the "toppley" bookcase lying in a
confused heap beside her, and at Helen, red and disheveled, readjusting
pins. Then she gave a shriek of delight and rushing upon Betty fastened
something to her shirt-waist.
"Get up!" she commanded Helen. "Hurry now, or you'll certainly be
killed."
In a twinkling the room was full of girls, shrieking, laughing, dancing,
tumbling over the books, sinking back on Betty's couch in convulsions of
mirth at the absurd spectacle she presented and getting up to charge into
the vortex of the mob and hug her frantically or shake her hand until it
ached. It was fully five minutes before Betty could extricate herself
from their midst, and with her trailing draperies limp and bedraggled
over one arm, make her way to Helen, who was standing by herself in a
corner, quietly enjoying the fun.
"Helen," she cried, catching the demure little figure in her arms,
"Helen, just think of it! I'm in Dramatic Club. Oh, Helen Chase Adams,
how did it ever happen?"
The room cleared out gradually after that, and the nicest part, Betty
thought, was having the people you liked best tell you in intelligible
English and comparative quiet how very glad they were.
"I never in all my life saw anybody look so funny as you did when we came
in," said Mary Brooks at last. "What were you doing, anyway?"
"Hanging a skirt," explained Betty, with great dignity.
"Was it going to have a court train all the way around?" inquired Mary.
"Tell her, Helen," commanded Betty.
"That was tucks, Mary," repeated Helen, obediently, and then everybody
laughed.
Under cover of the mirth Betty sought out Dorothy. "Where's Eleanor?" she
whispered.
"She went off for Sunday with Polly Eastman," Dorothy explained. "And
Betty, she's a trump after all. She--but I think perhaps she'd rather
tell you herself."
"Betty," broke in Nita Reese, "you must hurry and get dressed. You'll
have to appear at chapel, if you never get that skirt hung."
"Yes," said Betty, meekly.
"And I'll go and bribe the new maid, who hasn't learned the rules yet, to
send you up some breakfast," put in Madeline, the watchful.
Nita went off to make her bed and Dorothy to see Mary's prom. dress which
had just been sent on from home. Presently the new maid appeared with
toast and coffee and regrets that "the eggs was out, miss," and Betty sat
down at her desk to eat, while Helen, the Elizabethan lyrics quite
forgotten, rocked happily beside her.
"Helen," said Betty, a spoonful of hot coffee held aloft in one hand,
consternation hiding her dimples, "what in the world shall I do? I told
you I hadn't studied anything, and I can't flunk now."
"Oh, they won't call on you to-day," said Helen hopefully, counting the
Dramatic Club pins that made Betty's shirt-waist look like a small
section of a jeweler's window.
"Aren't they pretty?" said Betty, touching them lovingly. "I hope the
girls know which is which, because I don't. The one with the pearl gone
is Bob's, of course, and Dorothy's is marked on the back, and that's
Mary's, because she always pins it on wrong side up. One of the others is
Christy's, and one is that sweet Miss West's--she writes poetry, you
know, and is on the 'Argus.' Wasn't it lovely of her to pin it on me?"
"I should think anybody would be glad to have you wear their pin," said
Helen loyally, if ungrammatically.
"But to think the society wanted me!" said Betty in awe-struck tones.
"Helen, you know they never do take a person unless she amounts to
something, now do they? But what in the world do I amount to?"
"Does being an all-around girl count?" asked Helen. "Because the senior
that is such a friend of Eleanor Watson's said you were that, and that's
what you wanted to be, isn't it? But I think myself," she added shyly,
"that your one talent, that we used to talk about last year, you know, is
being nice to everybody."
The journey to chapel was a triumphal procession. The girls said such
pleasant things. Could they possibly be true, Betty wondered. Nan would
be pleased to know that she was somebody at last, even if she had missed
the team both years, and was always being mistaken for a freshman.
Sitting beside Dorothy, with the eight pins on her shirtwaist, and a
guilty consciousness that Miss Mills, who taught "Lit. II" was staring at
them from the faculty row, Betty resolved that she was going to be
different--to keep her room in order, not to do ridiculous things at
ridiculous times, and always to study Monday's lessons.
"I have tried harder lately," she thought, but it was reassuring outside
chapel to have Miss Mills stop to shake hands and Miss Hale say something
about being glad that Betty had turned out a thoroughly good student.
Mary Brooks said the same thing. "It's funny, Betty, how your innocent,
baby airs belie you. If we'd guessed what a splendid record you'd made
this year, we'd have taken you in even sooner."
Wherefore Betty was glad that she had looked up all the history
references and stayed at home from the Westcott House dance to write a
zoology report that Professor Lawrence himself had called excellent, and
done her best with the "Canterbury Tales."
"I have done better than I used to last year," she thought happily, "but
it wasn't for this, not one bit. It was because a person is ashamed not
to do her best up here."
"Will you take a few notes, please?" said Miss Mills in crisp,
businesslike tones, and Betty woke up to the fact that she had not
answered to her name in the roll.
"She saw you, though," whispered Christy, "and she was properly amused."
Miss Mills had finished her lecture and the class in "Lit. II" was making
its leisurely exit, when Jean Eastman caught up with Betty.
"Glad you've gone into the great and only," she said with a hearty hand-
shake. "And what do you think about the Lady Eleanor's latest escapade?"
"I don't know what you mean, Jean," said Betty quickly, remembering
Dorothy's hint, and wondering why Eleanor hadn't come to chapel, since
Polly was there, and she and Eleanor would surely have come back
together.
"Why, resigning from Dramatic Club, of course. Didn't she consult you
about it?"
"Jean, do you mean that Eleanor--has resigned--from Dramatic Club?"
Pleasure and bewilderment struggled for the mastery of Betty's face.
"Yes," said Jean carelessly. "Funny you hadn't heard of it, because it's
the talk of the whole college. She sent a note in Saturday night, it
seems, but nobody outside heard of it till this morning, and now we're
all speculating over the whys and wherefores. The Clio girls say that if
she did it because she thought she'd rather go into that, she will be
doomed to everlasting disappointment. For my part I don't think that was her
reason." Jean's tone hinted of deep mysteries.
"Of course not," said Betty indignantly. "Can't they see, Jean, that a
girl has got to have a big, splendid reason for doing a thing like that?"
"A big reason all right, but I don't know about the splendor," returned
Jean cheerfully, shouldering her way across the stream of girls in the
hall to join Beatrice Egerton.
To Jean's disappointment Beatrice had nothing to say about the
resignation, except that it was Eleanor's own affair and that all the
talk about it was utter nonsense. Then Jean, warming to her work,
ventured a direct attack.
"But Miss Egerton, wasn't there something queer about that story of
Eleanor's--the one that got her in? You were going to tell me once, but
you never did."
"I was going to tell you once, but I never did?" repeated Beatrice with
an extreme affability which those who knew her better than Jean would
have recognized as dangerous. "Go and ask Eleanor Watson that question if
you care to, Miss Eastman. I admire her far too much to wish to discuss
her private affairs with you. Thank you, I should like to go to your
house-play, but I have another engagement. The night isn't set? But
really, I'm so busy just now I can't promise, you know."
Beatrice Egerton had not spent four years at Harding College for nothing.
She was incapable of heroism herself, but she could appreciate certain
types of it in others, and she was bitterly ashamed of the part she had
played in Eleanor's affairs.
"Miss Wales," she said an hour later, when her path from class to class
crossed with Betty's, "where is Eleanor? I can't wait another minute to
see her."
Betty explained that Eleanor had not appeared at chapel or morning
classes.
"Then I suppose," said Beatrice impulsively, "that I am one of the people
she's trying to avoid. Go and see her the first chance you have, Miss
Wales, and tell her that I admire her grit--and that I'm too much ashamed
of myself to come and say so. Now don't forget. Did you ever see such
duds as the pickle heiress wears? Perfect rags!"
The mocking, insolent Beatrice was back again, the more debonnaire for
the effort that her confession had cost.
Betty meditated cutting her eleven o'clock class, decided that with those
eight pins on it would never do, and tried not to be glad that a severe
headache prevented Mademoiselle from meeting her French division at
twelve. She walked down to the Hilton House with a chattering little
freshman, one of Polly Eastman's chums and a devoted admirer of
Eleanor's.
"It's too bad that Eleanor Watson felt she ought to give up Dramatic
Club, isn't it?" said the girl. "Some of the girls think it was an
awfully queer thing to do, but I think it's fine to put your work first
when you don't feel strong enough to do everything."
"Yes, indeed," agreed Betty cordially, glad to be able to meet her on her
own ground.
"Polly is afraid," volunteered the little freshman, "that Eleanor is
going to break down. She's had to drop themes, too, you know. Polly said
they almost missed their train Saturday night because Eleanor would wait
to write to Miss Raymond about it, when anybody could see that Monday
would have done just as well. And she was so tired that she cried while
she was writing the note."
Betty shook off her loquacious companion by stopping on the second floor
to see a girl who was sure to be out, and went on up the back stairway to
Eleanor's corner.
There was no answer to her knock, and after a second trial she
deliberately opened the door and went in. Eleanor lay in a forlorn
disheveled little heap on her couch. Her cheeks were flushed with crying,
her eyes rimmed with dark circles that made them look bigger and brighter
than ever.
"Oh, I thought the door was locked," she cried, when Betty appeared.
"But luckily for me it wasn't." Betty took her up brightly, dropping
sociably down to the couch beside her. "You dear old Eleanor," she went
on quickly, "I've come to tell you that Dorothy thinks you're a trump and
Beatrice Egerton thinks you're a brick and I'm so proud of you I don't
know what to do. There now!"
"Oh, Betty, you can't be, after everything." Eleanor shook off the
clinging arms and sat up among the pillows. "Listen," she commanded. "It
isn't fair for me to take anything from you after what I've thought. I
had a letter from Mr. Blake this morning. He has been very nice to me
about the story, Betty. And he said he felt that he ought to tell me what
good friends I had here. So now I know all about it, but oh, Betty! I'd
thought such horrid things--"
"Never mind that now," said Betty. "Please don't tell me. It would only
hurt both of us, and it wouldn't be any use that I can see."
[Illustration: "NEVER MIND THAT NOW," SAID BETTY]
"I'm a coward, too," Eleanor went on steadily. "I was afraid to see
Beatrice, and now I'm afraid to see Jean and all the rest of them. Oh,
Betty, I can't bear to have people think I'm a freak. If I could take
those two notes back I would this minute. I hate giving things up. There,
now you know just how mean I am."
"No," said Betty, gently, "I only know how tired you are and how much you
needed some one to come in and tell you that we are all ready to stand by
you."
Eleanor waited a minute before she answered. "Betty," she said at last,
an uncertain little smile fluttering about her mouth, "shall you be glad
when you've got me through college?" Then she straightened with sudden
energy. "This is your day, Betty,"--she pointed to the pins,--"and I
won't spoil another minute of it. Of course there isn't any use in hiding
up here. I promise to go down to lunch and to take what's coming to me,
and do the best I can. Now run and let the rest of the college
congratulate you."
"And if the Chapin house girls should have a spread to-night over at
Rachel's--" began Betty, doubtfully.
"I'll come. I'll even be the life of the party. Only you're not to worry
about me one instant longer."
Eleanor kept her word to the letter for the rest of the day, but the
weeks that followed were necessarily full of ups and downs, of petty
humiliations and bitter discouragements, and Betty uncomplainingly shared
them all. The editors did what little they could, and Madeline and Miss
Ferris and Katherine and Rachel helped without understanding anything
except that Betty wanted them to; but the brunt of it all fell on her.
"I can't bother Miss Ferris with my blues," said Eleanor one afternoon,
"and I know I oughtn't to bother you with them."
"Nonsense!" laughed Betty. "I like being bothered," and did not mention
that she had given up the golf tournament because the practice would have
interfered with her position as Eleanor's confidante.
There were nice things to share too. Miss Raymond wrote a prompt and
cordial answer to Eleanor's note about the theme course. "After your
action of last week, I see no reason why you should not continue in my
classes on the old, pleasant footing. Please don't deprive me of the
privilege of seeing your work."
There was a note from the Dramatic Club too. Dorothy had managed to get
herself and Beatrice and Frances made a special committee to consider the
resignation--the first in the annals of the society,--and they decided to
accept it for one year from its date. After that, they said, they saw no
reason "to deprive the society of a valued member."
Betty was delighted, but Eleanor shook her head. "I may not have earned
it even then," she said gloomily.
"Leave it to Miss Ferris," suggested Betty. "She'll be a perfectly fair
judge. If she says you can take it then, you will know it's all right."
And to this arrangement, after some hesitation, Eleanor consented.
A week or two later Bob came to Eleanor, in a sad state of embarrassment.
"It's about the basket-ball song, Eleanor. The committee never saw it.
Babe was chairman, you know, and she put her shoulder out of joint
playing hockey the day the songs were called in, so I emptied the box for
her. I remember I stopped in my room on the way back and I must have
dropped yours there. Anyhow it turned up to-day in my top drawer. I'm
awfully sorry."
Eleanor took the song and read through a stanza or two, while Bob
wriggled, blushed and waited for the storm to burst. She had heard a good
deal about Eleanor Watson's uncertain temper.
But at first Eleanor only laughed. "Goodness! What jiggly meter! It's
lucky you lost it, Bob."
"No," said Bob, sturdily. "It was a dandy song, one of the best that came
in. Babe said so too. I am really awfully sorry. I'm too careless to
live."
"Well, you were lucky not to have found it a month ago," said Eleanor,
with a sudden flash of anger, and Bob departed, wondering.
"Little things do make a big difference," said Betty, when she heard the
story. "If they'd chosen it and everybody had said how clever it was--"
"I should have felt that I'd squared my account--proved that I could do
what I hadn't done, and I should never have owned up to anybody."
"Then you really ought to have been nicer to Bob," laughed Betty,
"because she helped you to come to the point."
"Yes, that helped," Eleanor admitted, soberly, "just as Dora helped and
Beatrice in her way and Jim in his; but you were the one who meant to
help, Betty. You got me the chance to begin over, and you made up my mind
for me about taking it, and you've kept me to it ever since."
"But El--"
"Now let's not argue about it," laughed Eleanor. "I only wanted to say
that I'm going to try to be nice to you to the extent of 'staying put'
this time. I don't mean that you shall have to waste your junior year
over me."