THE OWL'S NEST.
When Peggy escorted Lobelia Parkins back to her room, she found that it
was the one directly above her own. Point for point, the rooms were
alike, fire-escape and all,--so far as the actual outlines were
concerned; there, however, the likeness ended. There had been no Uncle
John, no Margaret, in this case. The room was furnished, evidently, by
the same hand that had dressed the girl, and with equal taste. The
carpet on the floor was costly, but hideous as staring colours and
execrable design could make it. The furniture was cumbrous, and the fact
that the ugly chairs were rosewood, and their cushions brocade, made
them neither beautiful nor comfortable. On the bureau were some bottles
of red Bohemian glass, such as were thought handsome fifty years ago;
an elephant of a writing-desk, staring with plush and gilding, almost
covered the table. Altogether, the room was as desolate as its occupant;
more could not be said. Lobelia seemed smaller and more shrunken than
ever amid all this tasteless display; she seemed conscious of it, too,
as she gazed piteously at Peggy. She had been crying, in a furtive,
frightened way; and, gazing at her, Peggy felt that it must be years ago
that she was crying, too, and hoping for nothing in the world save to
get to her room and have a good solid deluge of tears. At present it
seemed hardly likely that she should ever weep again; she felt strong
and confident, and was still burning with indignation, none the less
hotly that the outward flame had gone down. Her kind companion had been
obliged to leave them, with the promise of seeing them soon again. Peggy
thought she might stay a few minutes, though the gong for gym had
already rung.
"Now, Lobelia," she was saying,--"I am going to call you Lobelia, you
know, and you are to call me Peggy, and we are going to be friends.
Now, Lobelia, mind what I say! if those girls ever give you any more
trouble, you are to come straight to me. Do you hear?"
"Yes," said Lobelia, faintly.
"Have they tormented you before? Beasts! Or was this the first time?"
"Oh, not--not so much!" said the girl, deprecatingly. "A little
yesterday; but--I don't know whether they meant to be unkind, Peggy. I
know that my dress _is_ queer!"
"Don't be so meek!" cried Peggy, unable to repress a little stamp of her
foot, which made Lobelia start. "Have some spirit of your own, Lobelia.
I tell you, these girls are mean, cowardly wretches, not fit for girls
like the Owls to speak to. They don't speak to them much, either," she
added, "and I'm not going to any more than I can help."
Lobelia looked more miserable than ever. "Don't!" she said. "I can't
bear to have any one get into trouble on my account. It--it needn't
matter to you, Peggy. Of course you are very, very kind, and I think I
should have died if you had not come along just then, for I couldn't
seem to bear much more; but I don't want you to get into trouble."
"Who's going to get into trouble?" demanded Peggy. "Guess I can take
care of myself against such a set as that."
"I don't want you to get into trouble!" repeated Lobelia; and, as she
spoke, she glanced around the room with a peculiar shrinking look, one
would say a look of dread, that Peggy did not understand.
"Who's next door to you?" she asked, briefly. "Rose Barclay, for one, I
know. Who is on the other side?"
Lobelia thought it was another freshman, but was not sure.
"Have they troubled you?" asked Peggy, suspiciously.
But Lobelia shook her head, and seemed so distressed at the question
that Peggy did not know what to think.
"Please, please don't bother about me!" she implored. "I dare say it
will be a good deal better now, after you and Miss Merryweather being so
brave and so kind. I don't want to say anything against anybody.
Please, please forget all about it, Peggy."
"I want you to be brave yourself," cried Peggy; and Lobelia started
again, and shrank in her chair. "Don't be so--so--well, I don't know any
word but meeching, and Margaret won't let me say that. But have a spirit
of your own, and stand up to them, and give 'em as good as they send. I
would, I tell you, quick enough, if they tried it on me."
Lobelia looked at her with hopeless eyes. "But I am not you!" she said.
"I--Peggy, I know just how I look, and how I seem, and how little and
ugly and queer I am. I don't wonder they laugh, I don't, really. I
haven't any spirit, either; I can't have. You can't do anything with me;
it isn't any use."
Peggy gazed at her, with eyes almost as hopeless as her own. Yet she
must make one more attempt; and with it the honest blood came into her
face.
"Look here, Lobelia!" she said, "I am awkward, too, and shy, and--and
stupid, awfully stupid. Why, my cousin Rita used to call me--never
mind, that was only before she grew so kind! But I know what it is to be
laughed at, my dear! Only this morning, in rhetoric, Miss Pugsley was
just as hateful as she could be, and all the girls laughed; yes, they
did. So you are not so different as you think. Why,--I don't mind
telling you,--when I came along just now, I was trying to get to my own
room, so that I could have a good cry. There, Lobelia! now how do you
feel?" Lobelia raised her eyes with a wondering look; but next moment
her eyes fell on the looking-glass and she shook her head.
"No!" she said. "No, Peggy! You are kind, and you want to make me feel
comfortable; but look!"
She motioned toward the mirror. Peggy looked, and her kind heart sank.
She herself was no beauty; her round, fair face and honest blue eyes
were pleasant to look at, and she had beautiful hair, but that was all;
yet she could not help seeing that she was a very vision of loveliness
beside the sallow, puny, almost deformed aspect of her poor little
neighbour. She coloured deep with angry sympathy, but Lobelia only
smiled, a wan little smile.
"You see!" she said. "It's no use, Peggy."
For all answer, Peggy threw her arms around the shrinking figure, and
pressed it in a warm embrace. "I don't care!" she cried. "I don't say
you are pretty, you poor little thing, but just remember that you are my
friend, and if anybody dares to meddle with you again, they'll have to
reckon with me, that's all. And now I must go, or I shall lose all the
drill. Cheer up, Lobelia, and don't sit here and mope, mind! and if you
have any more trouble, just knock on the floor, and I'll be up in half a
quarter of a jiffy. Good-bye, dear!" and off she ran, feeling that at
least she had left some degree of comfort and cheer behind her.
Soon, however, came something that put Lobelia Parkins and her troubles
out of Peggy's head for the time. Bertha Haughton was not at the
gymnasium, but when Peggy came back to her own room after an hour of
rapture, she found a note pinned on her pincushion.
"DEAR PEGGY:--Study _hard_, please, and get
through before this evening. The Snowy Owl is
going to give us a Grand Tell about the wedding
she has been to, and we both want you to come,
too. I'm going to speak to Miss Russell, but
you'd better ask her, too; it will be all
right, for the Snowy has asked permission,
anyhow. Eight o'clock, just after reading; be
sure to come on time!
"Affectionately,
"BERTHA."
It was hard to study through that lovely afternoon, when the other
girls, or most of them, were out-of-doors, playing tennis or
basket-ball, and their voices came in at the window in every tone of
joyousness and delight. It was very hard to study the detested rhetoric
and history, but Peggy was strong in her good resolve, and bent steadily
over her books, trying her very best. Once, indeed, came a sore
temptation, when a ball struck her window lightly, and, going to look
out, she saw Grace Wolfe standing below.
"Come out, Innocent!" said the Scapegoat, in her deep, musical tones.
"Come and sport with me!
"The ship is ready and the wind blows fair,
And I am bound for the sea, Mary Anne!"
"Oh! Oh, thank you!" cried Peggy. "I wish I could, but I have to work
now, I'm afraid."
"Is this a time to think o' wark,
Wi' Scapegoat at the door?"
inquired Grace, looking up with her head on one side. "Why work at this
hour, Innocent? Even the slaves of virtue, even the Owls, are at play
now."
Peggy leaned out of the window; it really seemed as if her body would be
drawn out after her longing spirit, which had been out and away from the
first summons.
"Yes, the Owls!" she said. "That's just it, Miss Wolfe."
"No!" interrupted Grace. "Not Miss Wolfe! Not all AEsop! Impossible to be
wolf and goat at the same time, and do justice to either character. Let
it be Goat, or Grace, as you like."
"Grace, then, thank you! Well, you see, the Owls,--that is, Bertha asked
me to come to their room this evening, and of course I want to
dreadfully,--though not more dreadfully than I want to come out now,"
she added, wistfully. "And if I do, you see, I must get my rhetoric
done. It's awfully hard, and I am so stupid about it, it takes me for
ever. Oh, will you ask me again some time, please?"
The Scapegoat regarded her for a moment, standing with the ball in her
hand, swaying her light, graceful body to and fro.
"Another slave of virtue?" she said. "Can I permit this? Innocent, I
have half a mind to cause you to come down. I am to be thrown over for
owls, who have, if you will consider the matter, neither horns nor
hoofs? I am to let you stay and grind through the afternoon for them and
for my Puggy? Well--"
Her whole face seemed to lighten with whimsical determination. She laid
her hand on the fire-escape, and seemed on the point of mounting it,
when suddenly another change came over her. Her eyes darkened into their
usual melancholy look.
"Here's luck!" she said, abruptly. "See you later, Innocent!" She was
gone, and Peggy, with a revulsion of feeling, wished she had gone with
her. Bertha was a dear, and Miss Merryweather looked lovely, but neither
of them had the fascination of this strange girl, so unlike any one she
had ever seen in her life.
It was a forlorn afternoon; but Peggy stuck to her work manfully, and
had the satisfaction of closing the book at last with the feeling that
she was sure of it now, however things might be in the morning under
Miss Pugsley's hostile eye.
There was still a little time left before supper. She ran out to the
lawn, hoping to find Grace Wolfe still there, but she was disappointed.
The only occupants of the lawn were half a dozen sophomores clustered
together at one end. Blanche Haight was among them, and at sight of
Peggy she turned her back pointedly, and whispered to the others. They
turned with one accord and stared at Peggy, with a cool insolence that
made her blood boil within her and surge up in angry red to her
forehead. She could not do anything about it; they had a right to stare,
if they had no better manners. She returned the look for a moment, then
turned away with a sore and angry heart. Fortunately, at this moment
came out two classmates of her own whom she knew slightly,--mild,
pleasant girls, with no special traits of interest, but still friendly
and approachable. They were going to play tennis, and invited Peggy to
join them; so she had a good half-hour of exercise and pleasure, and
came in with rosy cheeks, and with the cobwebs all blown away for the
time.
At eight o'clock Peggy was standing before her glass, putting a last
touch to her hair, and surveying her image with some anxiety. Did she
"look nice?" Peggy had as little personal vanity as a girl could well
have; but she had learned from her cousin Margaret that it was part of
her duty to look as well as she could. Her cousin Rita would have had
her go further than this.
"Study, my child," Rita would cry, "to be beautiful! Let it be your
dream by night, your thought by day!" And, in all kindness, Rita would
try to teach her how to cross her feet so that they might look slender,
how to extend her little finger when she raised her hand, "not too much,
but to an exact point, _cherie_!" how to turn her head so as to show the
lines of the neck to advantage. But Peggy's own good sense, aided by
Margaret's calm wisdom, had told her the inappropriateness of Rita's
graceful airs and poses to her own sturdy personality. She was to look
nice; more she could not aspire to. So here she was to-night, in a
pretty blue silk waist, with a serge skirt of a darker shade, her hair
smoothly braided in one mammoth "pigtail," and tied with blue ribbons,
her neat collar fastened with a pretty pearl brooch. Thus attired, our
Peggy was truly pleasant to look upon; and her "Is that right,
Margaret?" brought a little satisfied nod of reply from the smiling
image in the glass.
Drawing near the Owl's Nest, she heard a hum of voices, and straightway
her heart sank again, and shyness possessed her. There was a crowd
there! They would all be juniors and seniors, and she the only freshman
among them. How could she go in? Oh! she almost wished she was up in the
other corridor with the younger girls!
But at this moment the door opened, and Bertha's kind face looked out.
"Here you are, Peggy!" she cried, cordially. "Come along; there's plenty
of room, for I've saved a place for you. Come!"
For a moment Peggy hung back, and knew how Lobelia Parkins felt; then
she made an effort, and followed Bertha into the room.
The Owl's Nest was a corner room, with windows on two sides. It seemed
to be furnished chiefly with books. There were the two brass beds, of
course, the twin bureaus, the desks, and table. All of these, except the
beds, were covered with books; bookshelves took up most of the wall
space, though there were two or three good pictures, among them a great
photograph of the sea, that almost dashed the spray in one's face, so
perfect was it. It was at a later visit that Peggy observed the books;
now, she was conscious of nothing save the girls. The room was certainly
full of them. There were three on each bed, curled up in every variety
of picturesque and comfortable attitude; two sat on one of the bureaus,
having pushed books and toilet articles up into a toppling and highly
perilous mountain behind them; four more crouched somehow on the rather
narrow window-seats. The rest were on the floor, except two early birds,
who had come in time to get the two chairs. The floor was made
comfortable with sofa-pillows, borrowed from the whole length of the
corridor. Altogether, there might have been twenty girls in the room,
and every girl was, or seemed to be, talking as fast as her tongue could
move.
Peggy was hailed with a bird-like call from one corner.
"My Veezy-vee! come here, Peggy Montfort, and sit by me."
It was Viola Vincent. She was curled up at the head of one of the beds.
She wore the prettiest pink tea-gown imaginable, and her hair was a
wonder of puffs and curls.
"Come here!" she repeated, patting the pillows. "Lots of room; miles!
Let her come here, Fluffy!"
"Yes, she shall, in a minute, V.," replied Bertha. "But first,--Toots,
here's Peggy Montfort!"
The Snowy Owl came swiftly out of the closet, where she had been
performing some mystic rite; she took Peggy's two hands in hers, and
held them in a warm, firm grasp that was the very soul of cordiality.
"I'm so glad!" she said. "How's the poor little thing? Better? I'm sure
you did her a great deal of good."
"Oh, no!" stammered Peggy, pleased and confused. "I couldn't really do
anything; but she is feeling better."
Gertrude Merryweather nodded wisely. "My dear, you can do a great deal
for her!" she said. "We'll have a talk sometime; no chance now. Only,
Bertha has been telling me things, and I'm so glad you are in our
street! There, now V. shall have you."
Judge of the glow at Peggy's heart, on these words from the Junior
President, the best-loved girl--or so it was said--in the whole school.
Those foolish tears actually got half-way up to her eyes,--only they
were very different from the last tears; but fortunately Viola's
high-pitched babble drove them back again.
"My _dear_! How nice you look! perf'ly _fine_! doesn't she, V.? Say,
that's a dandy pin you've got on, simply _dandy_! There! isn't this too
quaint for anything? You comfy? so'm I! Room, my dear? gallons of room!
I haven't seen you for an age; where have you kept yourself? I looked
into your room, though, and it's perf'ly _fine_! I told you it would be,
when you had things fixed. Your chintz is too perfectly sweet for
anything; isn't it, V.? We were simply cold with envy, weren't we, V.?"
"Do cackle for yourself, if you must cackle, V.!" responded Vivia
Varnham, who sat on the same bed, a little lower down. "I can't hear
myself think, you make such a noise."
"No, really?" cried Viola. "But that must be such an advantage
sometimes, V. But, say! we came here to hear the Snowy talk, didn't we?
She hasn't had much chance yet, has she? Are you ready to talk, Snowy?
Oh, you duck! it is too perfectly enchanting to have you back again. I
haven't lived since you went away, have I, V.? I've been simply a
vegetable, haven't I, V.? Potatoes, my dear, are lively compared to me.
_Are_ you ready to talk, Snowy?"
"If you are ready to have me," replied the Snowy Owl, laughing. "First,
however--here!"
She produced a mammoth box of "marshmallows," and handed it around. It
was received with a shout.
"Toast 'em!" cried one. "Hat-pins!" cried another. There was a movement
toward the gas-jet; but Bertha Haughton checked it decidedly. "You have
come here to hear the Snowy tell!" she said. "It's a long tell, and if
you begin toasting now, there won't be time. Tell first, toast
afterward! that's what I say!"
"Hark to the Fluffy! she speaks well!" cried the girls. There was
silence; and Gertrude Merryweather, sitting on the floor, with her hands
clasped around her knees, began her "tell."
[Illustration: THE GRAND TELL IN THE OWL'S NEST.]