THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER.
No submarine warfare interrupted the peaceful passage of our
honeymooners. The voyage was delightful to both of them after all the
trials they had been through. Judy was as much at home on the water as
on land, literally a born sailor, as she had been born at sea. Kent
loved a ship and all the many aspects of the ocean. The lazy days on
deck, with their chairs drawn as close together as chairs could be,
their hands clasped under the steamer rug, seemed like a beautiful
dream, only a dream that was going to last for a lifetime, not the lazy
days on deck but the being together and never talking out. Being lazy
was not the idea of eternal bliss common to either of these young
persons. Kent felt there were worlds to conquer in the architectural
universe and he meant to do his share towards conquering them; and with
Judy by his side, he gloried in the task before him. As for Judy, she
meant to paint like mad and to work up many ideas she had teeming in her
head. She was thankful for the reels of undeveloped snapshots she had in
her trunk, as she was going to use them as a jog to her memory for the
numerous illustrations she meant to make in an article she was thinking
of writing on Paris at the outbreak of the war.
Cousin Sally's admonition to work for the Allies was not forgotten,
either. Judy was planning a busy winter for herself in New York just as
soon as she and Kent could get themselves settled in an apartment.
"It must be very inexpensive, too, Kent. We must save money."
Kent couldn't help laughing at Judy's solemn face. What would Judy's
friends say at her becoming penurious? Judy, the spendthrift!
"You see, I've always cost poor Bobby a lot of money; not that he has
ever complained, but I don't mean to be a burden to you, Kent."
Kent had no answer for such foolishness but to squeeze her hand.
"I'd be perfectly happy if I just knew that Bobby and poor little Mumsy
were all right."
"Why, they may be on the high seas this minute. We will surely hear
something of them when we get to New York."
* * * * *
Sandy Hook was at last sighted and then came the slow, majestic steaming
into the harbour! Liberty still held her torch on high with the gulls
circling around her. The same little tugs were puffing up and down, with
the great ferries plying back and forth like huge shuttles. New York's
sky line was as fascinating to Mrs. Kent Brown as it had ever been to
Judy Kean.
"Oh, Kent, I love it so! How could I have stayed away so long?" cried
Judy, rapturously making sketches in the air.
The pier was filled with an eager crowd, awaiting the arrival of the
steamer.
"There won't be any one for us," said Judy rather wistfully. "Your
mother is in Kentucky, and of course Molly couldn't leave the baby to
come meet us, and there isn't any one else."
Kent smiled and said nothing. He was almost sure he saw the figure of
his tall brother-in-law, Professor Green, towering above the crowd, but
he was afraid he might be mistaken and could not bear to disappoint
Judy.
It was Edwin Green and hanging on one arm was Molly (Kent knew her by
the blue scarf). And who was that on the other arm? Oh, what a mother!
It was Mrs. Brown, her face uplifted and glowing.
"Judy, look a little to the left of the second post! Right in front of
us, honey! What do you see?"
"Oh, it's Molly! I can tell her by her blue scarf--and Kent! Kent,
there's your mother and dear Edwin!" Then Judy clutched her young
husband's arm. "Look a little to the right, standing by your
mother--there's a big man that looks like Bobby--See, with a little
doll baby woman in front of him--he's keeping the crowd off of
her--see! see! It is--it is Bobby and little Mumsy!"
Judy, who not much more than two weeks before had considered herself the
most unfortunate and friendless of mortals, now knew that there was not
such a happy person in all the world. How long the vessel took to be
made fast to the pier! And then such a crowding and pushing! Every one
on board seemed to have some one on the pier he had not seen for
centuries and must get to immediately.
"They can't be as anxious to hug their mothers as I am, and I know they
haven't any Bobbies," she complained. "And I am sure they have not been
shipwrecked like you and given up for drowned by their families. They
ought to let us off first."
Mr. Kean was behaving exactly as though he were at a football game. He
was jumping up and down and waving and shouting, and his rooting egged
Kent to make a rush for the gangway, holding Judy like a pigskin; and
once on the gangplank there was nothing to do but push and be pushed by
the crowd until they shot out on the pier into the arms of their waiting
and eager families.
With every one talking at once, it was difficult to get any accurate
knowledge about one another, but when it was all sifted out it developed
that Mr. and Mrs. Kean had finally been allowed by the Imperial
Government to leave Berlin, in fact, they had been encouraged to go. Mr.
Kean was looked upon as a dangerous person, a lunatic at large, and they
did not want the responsibility or expense of caring for him. His jokes
got to be too many and serious, and when he became such an adept in
evading the spy set to watch him that two had to be detailed for that
duty, the powers that be evidently decided that what knowledge he
possessed of the topography of Turkey did not outweigh in importance the
wearing out of perfectly good soldier material. He worried the spy so
that he was nothing more than skin and bones, poor fellow!
They had arrived in New York only the day before and had immediately got
Molly on the long distance telephone. Of course, they knew nothing of
Judy's being married, but unhesitatingly approved of the step Kent had
taken and did not consider him at all high-handed. Mr. Kean, being of a
most impulsive disposition, could understand it in other persons, and
little Mrs. Kean was so used to her comet-like husband and daughter that
she was never astonished by anything they did.
"I was not the impulsive one this time, though, Bobby," Judy declared
when they finally settled themselves around the luncheon table at the
hotel where a second bridal feast had been prepared, ordered by the
lavish Bobby. "It was Kent. I had no idea of ever being married--in
fact, it seemed to me to be not quite decent to be married so quickly
when I was in such deep mourning--The wedding was quiet because of the
recent bereavement----"
"In mourning! You, Judy, in mourning for whom?" and poor little Mrs.
Kean gasped, not knowing what she was to learn now.
"Why, for Kent himself. Nothing but the bombs dropped in Paris kept me
from having my best serge suit dyed black. Molly, I always said I'd make
a fetching widow, and I did all right. Kent thought I was just lovely in
the hat I fixed for his mourning."
"Oh, Judy! The same old Judy!" exclaimed Molly fondly.
Molly had thought it would be impossible for her to go to New York
to meet the incoming steamer with its precious cargo, but Edwin had
declared she should go; so little Mildred was taken on the jaunt as
well, with the eager Katy as nurse. Kizzie was already installed as
cook and Katy was proving a most careful and reliable nurse. Molly was
looking and behaving more like herself and no longer had to let her
patient husband go off to his lectures like a bachelor with no wife to
pour his coffee.
"And now, you and Kent and Mr. and Mrs. Kean must all come to Wellington
to visit us," announced the hospitable Molly. "Mustn't they, Edwin?"
"Indeed they must," said Edwin obediently, but in his heart wondering
where Molly would put all of them. The old red house on the campus was
large but had not very many rooms. The young professor could never quite
get used to the Browns and their unbounded hospitality. His favorite
story was one on his mother-in-law; how, when one of her sons brought
home the whole football team to spend the night, she calmly took the top
mattresses off all the beds (the beds at Chatsworth were fortunately
equipped with box mattresses and top mattresses) and made up pallets on
the floor, thereby doubling the sleeping capacity of her hospitable
mansion.
"I can't come, Molly,--mighty sorry," said Kent, "but my job must be
held down now. They have kept it open for me long enough."
"And I stay with Kent!" declared Judy.
"Hurrah, hurrah! Her mother's own daughter!" cried the delighted Bobby.
"I was wondering what kind of wife my girl would make; now I know. I
wouldn't take anything for that: 'I stay with Kent.'"
"Oh, I'm going to be terribly domestic. I found that out while I was
living with the Tricots. What's more, I can make tarts--the best ever. I
can hardly wait to get a flat and a pastry board to make some for Kent."
"You might use your drawing board for a pastry board," teased her
father. "I fancy art is through with."
"Through with, indeed! Why, Bobby, I am astonished and ashamed of you! I
am going to paint all the time that I am not making tarts, and what time
is left, I am going to knit socks and make bandages for the wounded."
"And poor me! When do I come in?" asked Kent.
"You come in early and behave yourself or I'll spend the rest of the
time making suffrage speeches," laughed the war bride.
* * * * *
And now since we must leave our friends some where, what better time and
place than at this second wedding breakfast, while all of them are
together and happy? Perhaps we shall meet them again when the old red
house on the campus shall be taxed to its utmost in its endeavor to
behave like Chatsworth. We shall see Judy and Kent in their little flat
and mayhaps taste one of Judy's tarts. We must know more of Molly's
girls at Wellington and meet dear Nance Oldham and little Otoyo Sen
again. It is hard to part forever with our friends and those who know
Molly Brown feel that all her friends are theirs.
So I hope our readers will be glad to meet again "Molly Brown's College
Friends."
THE END.
[Illustration]
Marjorie Dean
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* * * * *
Transcriber's note:
Minor printer's errors have been corrected. Otherwise the original
has been preserved, including inconsistent spelling and hyphenation.