CLIMAXES
“Ma’s coming, all right!” Montana Marie told Betty gleefully, a week or
so after the elopement that didn’t come off. “I told her it might be
her last chance at a Harding commencement, and she thinks that means
that I’m to be in gay Paree with her again next winter, so she’s in a
very good humor. I hope it’s ripping hot weather for commencement. Hot
weather wilts Ma right down, and makes her easier to manage.”
A few days later Marie had another announcement to make. “Pa is coming
East too. Georgia addressed her invitation to Mr. and Mrs. James J.,
just out of politeness. Now she is wild on the question of tickets for
things. If Pa really comes here, her sister Constance will have to go
on standing room to the senior play and the Ivy concert. For my part
I’m crazy to see Pa, but I don’t imagine he’ll care much about these
commencement doings. His real reason for coming East is to hire an
architect in New York--I don’t know what he’s going to build, but I
wrote right back and told him about your friend Mr. Watson.” Marie
giggled amiably. “That address that Mrs. Hinsdale gave me is forever
coming in handy.”
Betty wished, quite unreasonably, that Marie’s memory for addresses
was shorter, or her interest in Jim’s career less personal. Whatever
Mr. O’Toole meant to build, it would probably be built in Montana; and
Montana is a very, very long way from Harding. It was much nicer having
Jim in New York.
Meanwhile Betty was far too busy to spend much thought on the O’Toole
family’s affairs; when Mrs. O’Toole actually appeared on the scene,
it would be time enough for bothering with her. 19--’s third year
reunion was equally imminent and much more interesting. Of course the
members who lived in Harding were depended upon to attend to all such
details as boarding places and class supper, to plan for informal
“stunt-meetings,” and to arrange a reunion costume that should go far
ahead of that worn by any other returning class. Besides all this, the
B. C. A.’s had decided to give a party for 19--. Madeline had glibly
agreed to plan it, and had got as far as confiding to all her friends
that this time she had really thought of something extra-specially
lovely, when the Coach and Six took her to New York, and Agatha
Dwight’s interest in the fairy play kept her there. At first the B. C.
A.’s waited hopefully for her return. Then they held a solemn conclave
to discuss their dilemma. But the only plans they could evolve seemed
so prosaically commonplace beside Madeline’s most casual inspirations
that they continued to wait, this time with the calmness born of
despair. For the B. C. A. invitations had been sent out broadcast to
all 19--ers, and though 19-- could have an absurdly good time over
“just any old thing,” it wasn’t “just any old thing” that they would
expect of the B. C. A.’s. Finally Betty wrote to Roberta Lewis, who
would be passing through New York on her way up to Harding. “Capture
Madeline,” she ordered summarily. “Bring her up here if you can, but
anyway make her tell you about the B. C. A. party. Don’t come away
without her plans for it, on penalty of being put out of the Merry
Hearts--almost.”
Luckily for Roberta, Madeline was easily captured. She was sulking in
solitary state in her studio apartment, because, though Agatha Dwight
liked the fairy play tremendously, no manager could be found to put it
on.
“They say, ‘Stick to your old line,’” grumbled Madeline. “As if the one
play I’ve written--about a modern woman--was a line. They say, ‘New
York doesn’t care for fairies.’ As if every sensible person wasn’t born
caring for fairies--the really-truly mystic sprites like mine. Oh, I
suppose the thing’s not good enough! Anyway I won’t grumble about it
any more. I’ll plan a B. C. A. party that will make dear old 19-- laugh
itself sick. Not a fairy party--a--a germ party, Roberta. You shall
be the Ph. D. Germ--in an Oxford gown with a stunning scarlet hood. I
shouldn’t wonder if Miss Ferris will lend you hers. Then there’ll be
the Love Germ, and the Wedding Bells Germ, the Club Germ, the Society
Germ, and the Germ of a Career. And little Betty Wales shall be the
college girl that they all viciously attack. It shall be a play with
a moral,--one of nice old Mary’s nice little morals. And the moral
shall be: ‘It isn’t the Germ you like that gets you; it’s the Germ you
can’t live without.’ Could you imagine life without a Ph.D., Roberta?
If you could, then the modern microbes are still fighting their hardest
for you, and the Love Germ will get you yet if you don’t watch out.
But Betty is the ideal object for the attack of the modern microbes,
because she’s a little of everything, except possibly clubs. Whereas,
the Society microbe wouldn’t look at you, Roberta. It would run away at
your approach.”
“Will you come up to Harding to-morrow?” asked Roberta anxiously,
ignoring the aspersion upon her ability to be a society butterfly.
“This afternoon if you like,” Madeline returned, as calmly as if she
hadn’t been implored by every mail for two weeks past to come up and
help with the reunion arrangements.
The B.C.A. party turned out a Merry Hearts’ party. Roberta Lewis made
a beautiful Ph. D. microbe, with her hair “scrunched back” under a
mortar board, big spectacles, and a manner copied from an astronomy
instructor who was universally known in Harding circles as Miss Prunes
and Prisms. Roberta hadn’t acted since the senior play, she said, but
she was in splendid form nevertheless. So was K., who, as the Pedagogic
Microbe, delivered a speech founded on her personal experiences that
brought down the house.
“You must each make up her own part,” Madeline told the cast, when
they met for the first (and only) rehearsal. “I haven’t had time to
write out the speeches. Babbie, you ought to know how to lobby for the
society act. You liked it pretty well that first winter you were out of
college. Eleanor, you’re in love; well, explain the sensation. Babe,
you don’t act as if marriage was a failure; speak up for it. Nita,
you’re not a really energetic club-woman, I’m happy to say, so here are
some few ideas to help you out. I shall speak of a career from bitter
experience. Betty, all you have to do is to look thoughtful while we
talk, and scared while we fight for you. At the end, when we decide
to give you your choice, you are to explain that, since the world is
too full of a number of things,--namely modern microbes,--the thing to
do is to shut your eyes and decide which one you can’t live without.
And until you’ve decided, you propose to enjoy life all around. See?
I’ll write out your speech, if I can get time, because it ought to be
exactly right, to get the best effect. Fire away now, Roberta.”
The rehearsal proceeded amid wild confusion. Madeline coolly advised
the cast to improve their lines, reminded them encouragingly that the
costumes would help out wonderfully, and departed, to compose a new
ploshkin song, while the supper committee, to whom she had promised it
weeks before, waited patiently on her door-steps to seize and carry it
to the printer.
The B. C. A. party was sandwiched in between a thunder-shower and the
Glee Club’s commencement concert. The stage was an elm-shaded bank, the
audience room as much of the adjacent back-campus as would hold 19--,
and a few stray specimens of its fiancés, its husbands, and its babies.
The “show” was cheered to the echo, and the “eats” which followed,
carefully selected from the Tally-ho’s latest and most popular
specialties, were voted as good as the show.
“Of course,” the supper committee chanted, besieging Madeline while she
ate, “of course we want it repeated with the class supper stunts.”
Madeline waved them away with a spoonful of strawberry ice.
“Talk to the cast. This is one piece of idiocy that I’m not responsible
for. Oh, I helped plan it, and I wrote the moral. That’s positively all
I did. Congratulate K. and Roberta, not me. And have it again for class
supper if you really want it. Couldn’t we run in the class animals for
a sort of chorus--‘Beware the Love Germ, 19--ers,’ and so on. Ploshkins
and Red Lions, and Jabberwocks and Ritherums would make a lovely
Moralizing Chorus. Yes, I’ll write it, but I won’t make wings for any
more animals. I’ve decided that I’m too old and too distinguished to
make any more animals’ wings.”
19--’s class supper was at the Tally-ho--of course. T. Reed had brought
little T. to the reunion, and little T. had brought his big ploshkin
mascot to the supper. The undistinguished Mary Jones and her plain,
frizzle-haired little girl were there with the class loving-cup. All
the old cliques and crowds were there, sitting as they used to sit,
but fused, by the esprit de corps that no class had quite so strongly
as 19--, into a big, splendid, happy whole. Eleanor was toast-mistress
again. It was once toast-mistress, toast-mistress forever, with 19--.
Jean Eastman had a speech called “Over the Wide, Wide World,” all
about wintering in Egypt and buying rugs in Persia and yachting in
the strange South Seas. T. Reed had one on “Such is Life,” all about
raising babies and mushrooms and woolly lambs on a ranch in Arizona.
Nita’s was called, on the menu-card, “Keep your eye on the Ball,” and
it was a funny muddle of all the finest things that 19--ers had done by
everlasting keeping at it. Roberta’s degree was one of the fine things,
and Christy’s fellowship; and Madeline’s play was the grand climax,
only Madeline spoiled the rhetorical effect by calling out, “Nita, you
know I always do things by not keeping at them. I hereby refuse to
point your moral and adorn your tale.”
In the midst of Nita’s speech Betty Wales disappeared. The few girls
who saw her go thought that she was modestly trying to escape hearing
her praises sounded by Nita, as one of the people 19-- was proudest
of. Helen Adams, who had noticed Nora come in and speak to Betty,
thought that some domestic crisis demanded her attention, and hoped she
wouldn’t have to stay in the kitchen very long. For Helen had a speech
herself by and by, and she had planned to get through it by looking
right into Betty’s intent, encouraging little face. But Betty didn’t
get back in time for Helen’s toast nor for the two that came after it.
The stunt-doers were gathering in Flying Hoof’s stall to put on their
costumes, and the rest of the girls were pushing back their chairs to
face the platform that Thomas the door-boy had built in front of the
fireplace, when Betty Wales got back. She looked as if the domestic
crisis had been of a strenuous sort, but at last happily terminated.
Her face was flushed, and her hair curled in little damp rings on
her forehead. But her expression was as serene as possible, her eyes
sparkled with fun, and her dimples just wouldn’t stay in, though she
tried to be duly serious over having lost half the toasts--and half the
supper too.
“But the stunts haven’t begun, have they? Does ours come first? Did any
engaged girls run around the table that we don’t know about already?
Little Alice Waite! Oh, how nice! Don’t begin our stunt just yet. I
want to speak to Madeline a minute. Oh, well, never mind, if they’re
all waiting.”
So the “College Girl and the Modern Microbes, with a Moralizing
Chorus of Class Beasts,” went at once on the boards. Betty Wales was
no actress; not even her warmest admirers had ever imagined that she
possessed histrionic ability, and it was only to satisfy a whim of
Madeline’s that she had taken what she laughingly dubbed “a regular
stick part” in the Germ play. But at the class supper performance she
surprised everybody by her vivacity. She informed the Ph. D. Germ that
she’d better take a course in doing her hair becomingly. She mocked
the Pedagogic Germ with the hated epithet “Schoolma’am! schoolma’am!”
She caught the Love Germ by an insecure white wing, and assured it
that nobody fell in love with girls who were just pinned together. All
through the contest of the Germs for her she kept interjecting remarks
in a disconcertingly unexpected fashion. And at last the time came
for the moral. Betty hesitated just a minute, and then began her one
regular speech. She began it just as usual, and she went on just as
usual until she came almost to the end: “So the thing to do is to shut
your eyes and decide which one you can’t do without.” At this point
she shut her eyes for an impressive moment. Then she opened them, and,
with a half-frightened, half-merry look at Madeline, she walked up to
the Love Germ and the Wedding Bells Germ, and dragged them, one on each
side of her, to the front of the platform.
[Illustration: “I’VE SHUT MY EYES AND I’VE CHOSEN”]
“And so I’ve shut my eyes and I’ve chosen, and--please everybody
congratulate me quick! Eleanor Watson first, please, Eleanor dear.”
Betty Wales ran down from the platform, still dragging the winning
Germs after her, and followed by a riotous mob of other Germs and Class
Animals, which was speedily joined by another mob of all the finest
class of 19--.
There were no more stunts that night. When the supper committee stopped
trying to get a chance to congratulate Betty and hear how it all
happened, why, by that time it was much too late for stunts. It was
time--and long past time--for the class march to the other suppers, to
return serenades and congratulations, and then to visit “Every Loved
Spot on the Whole Blessed Campus,” as the new ploshkin song put it,
and to sing the ploshkin song and the other reunion favorites until
everybody was hoarse enough and tired enough to be ready to stop
reunioning--and that meant extra-specially hoarse and extra-specially
tired; and time in plenty was needed for its accomplishment.
When it was all over, nobody knew anything about Betty’s engagement,
except that it was to Jim Watson.
“I was out of the room when they ran around the table,” she had
explained over and over. “So I just spoiled Madeline’s lovely moral to
tell you. But she says she doesn’t mind, and I wanted you all to know,
while we’re here together, how blissfully happy I am.”
“After the rest are out of the way the Merry Hearts will meet in the
Peter Pan Annex, top story.” So the word went round, when 19-- was
finally ready to disperse. “The fifteeners went to bed ages ago, so
it’s empty. We don’t want to go to bed.”
“I should say not,” each Merry Heart acknowledged the news of the
rendezvous. “We want to hear all about Betty Wales.”
“Yes, Jim came up to-night unexpectedly. Where is he now? In bed, I
certainly hope,” said Betty Wales. “Ye-es, he’d asked me before, but he
never asked me--hard enough. And then Madeline’s rule--whether or not
you can live without a person--or a thing--is ever so much easier to
apply when you’re maybe going to lose the person for a long, long time.”
“And were you going to lose Jimmie for a long time?” inquired Eleanor,
who didn’t know any more than the rest how the great desire of her
heart--second only to her plans for her own and Dick’s happiness--had
suddenly become a reality.
Betty nodded proudly. “He’s got a splendid big commission. It’s to
build a town--a whole nice little new town--factories, schools,
houses, everything, at a mine and a water power that Mr. O’Toole owns.
First he’s got to go to Germany to work up some plans for it. It will
all take several years. And I saw that I couldn’t get along without----”
“Stop! That’s a very dangerous moral,” cut in Madeline hastily. “Don’t
keep repeating it around here, or somebody else may be infected with
the Love Germ.”
“Very well,” agreed Betty gaily, “then I won’t say over the dangerous
moral. But--the town he has to build is thirty miles from a railroad
that hasn’t been built. I mean--the town isn’t there yet either. And
it will be on a railroad by and by, but it isn’t now. Wouldn’t it be
losing Jim pretty hard to have him away off there without me?”
“How about the Coach and Six?” demanded Madeline severely.
Betty went on smiling her happy little smile. “I’ll have to start it
off somehow before I go. Mr. Morton will understand. He likes Jim. Oh,
and when I’m gone there will be a place for Straight. So the twins are
settled, and that’s one thing off my mind.”
“Who’ll undertake Montana Marie O’Toole?” demanded Madeline inexorably.
“She isn’t a thing that you can start off and then leave to go on by
herself in proper style.”
Betty laughed. “I don’t know about that. It’s Mr. O’Toole who has
commissioned Jim, on Marie’s recommendation, to build the town. So
she’s really responsible about Jim and me. I’m going to tell her
to-morrow that, since she can plan things so well for other people,
it’s time she managed her own affairs better. That is, of course I
shall speak to her mother for her, because I promised to. Oh, dear, we
can’t discuss that, because no one is supposed to know about it yet.
But my freshman is all right, anyway.”
“I suppose you think the Tally-ho and Morton Hall and the Student’s
Aid and small Dorothy can get along without you,” continued Madeline,
who was going to miss Betty dreadfully, and was teasing her to avoid
showing her real feelings.
“Of course!” Nothing could daunt Betty Wales to-night. “Anything can
get along without anybody--except--Jim and me. Besides, I shall have
time to see to all those things before I’m--married. I don’t know when
Jim is going to Germany. I only saw him for a little minute----”
“Oh!” cried her friends, remembering how many toasts she had missed.
“Well, we didn’t get to anything practical like time,” Betty defended
herself. “But if he has to go too soon, why, we can’t be married till
he gets home. It takes ages to get ready to be married, doesn’t it?”
She looked from one to another of the prospective brides, each of whom
nodded solemnly. Betty sighed. “I never thought of that. Jim just said
that the trip to Germany would be a nice honeymoon. I wonder how soon
he has to start. Girls, I really must go to bed. I want to be up early
to-morrow morning to talk it all over.”
“With us?” demanded Madeline.
“No, human question-point,” Betty told her severely. “With Jim.”