A PAINFUL INTERVIEW.
As a result of a private conference among the Lookouts that evening, a
trained nurse arrived on Sunday afternoon to look after their injured
friend. Ronny, with her usual magnificent generosity, wished to take the
expenses for Katherine's care and treatment upon herself. To this her
chums would not hear. "We all love Kathie," Muriel declared. "I think we
ought to divide her expenses among us." Lucy Warner was particularly
pleased with Muriel's proposal. She had earned an extra hundred dollars
that summer by doing typing in the evenings. She felt, therefore, that
she held the right to offer a portion of it in the cause of her
particular friend.
"It seems too bad to go on having good times with poor Kathie so sick,"
deplored Marjorie, as she and Jerry softly closed the door of the
latter's room after a brief visit to her following their return from
Houghton House.
"I know it, but what good will it do us to cut out recreation, so long
as we can't spend the time with her?" argued Jerry. "We know she is all
right and going to get well. It isn't as though she wasn't expected to
live. The nurse said a lot of the girls had come to her door to inquire
for her. She wouldn't let any of 'em see her. I think the Sans have been
on the job. They are probably scared for fear Kathie will make it hot
for Leslie Cairns when she is well again."
"She wouldn't." Marjorie shook her curly head. "Neither would I, if I
were in her place. It ought to be a lesson to the Sans without any
further fuss about it. They are the only ones who drive faster than they
should."
"If Miss Cairns had run down a citizen of the town of Hamilton then
there would have been a commotion. It is a very good thing for her that
a traffic officer wasn't around. He would have arrested her, sure as
fate. I wish one had been on the scene," declared Jerry, with a trace of
vindictiveness.
That the Sans were manifestly uneasy over the accident was evidenced by
their gathering in Leslie Cairns' room that afternoon for a confab.
Leslie herself hid whatever trepidation she was feeling under an air of
cool bravado. She listened to all that her companions had to say on the
subject without vouchsafing more than an occasional curt reply.
"Really, Les, you don't seem to understand that you may get into an
awful mess over running down that beggardly dig!" Joan Myers at length
exclaimed in sharp irritation. "Suppose the whole thing is put before
President Matthews or the Board. We may all lose the privilege of having
our cars at college. I read of a college out west the other day where
that happened as the result of an accident to a student."
"Oh, forget it!" Leslie waved a derisive hand. "I shall fix things O.K.
Don't make any mistake about that. I'll send this beggar a whopping old
basket of fruit tomorrow and a handsome box of flowers. You girls had
better part with a little change in the same cause. Anyway, I have
pretty solid ground to stand on. Who is going to prove that I didn't
sound a horn? It couldn't be heard above the thunder. If I drove fast, I
had reason for it. Why should I drive my car at a crawl and be caught in
the storm? Was there a cop around to say I was speeding? There was not.
I certainly won't ever admit it. It was simply one of those unfortunate
accidents. So sorry, I'm sure. What?" Leslie finished in a high, mocking
treble.
It raised a laugh, as she intended it should. Her companions began to
breathe more freely. Leslie could certainly be relied upon to clear
herself.
Before evening of the following Monday Katherine's room resembled a
combination fruit and flower market. Not only the Sans but her real
friends and impersonal sympathizers also sent in their friendly
tributes. Her condition much improved, she asked particularly to see
Marjorie and Lucy Warner.
"Not more than fifteen minutes, please," said the nurse, as the two
girls tip-toed into the sick room shortly before dinner.
"I wanted to see you so much." Katherine smiled a trifle wanly. "You
were so good to me when first I was hurt. I remember the whole thing. I
won't try to talk of that now. Later, when you can stay longer. There is
something I wish you would do for me. Nurse read me the names of the
cards on the flowers and fruit. The Sans sent a good deal of it. I--I--"
a thread of color crept into Katherine's pale cheeks. "I don't want it.
I can't bear it in the room. I understand them so well. I don't care to
be harsh, but I would like you to take all of it except a basket of
fruit and a few flowers and send it to the Hamilton Home for Old Folks.
It is on Carpenter Street. It would please them so much. I can't eat
one-tenth of the fruit before it spoils, and you girls don't want it, I
know. If it is mostly all sent away, then no one can feel hurt, neither
the Sans nor my real friends. The Sans need not be afraid. I am not
going to make Miss Cairns any trouble. She has asked twice to see me. I
shall see her when I am a little stronger and tell her so."
"That is sweet in you, Kathie," Marjorie approved. She referred not only
to Katherine's lenience of spirit toward Leslie Cairns, but to her
proposed thoughtful disposal of the fruit and flowers. "I'll ask Leila
to take your gifts to the old folks in her car tomorrow. I know she will
be glad to be able to do something for you. I understand how you feel
about--well--some things. I believe I'd feel the same if I were in your
place."
"I wanted to be excused from my classes and be your nurse, Kathie," Lucy
solemnly assured her chum, her green eyes full of devotion. "Ronny said
'no' that a trained nurse would be best. I miss you dreadfully. Let me
come and see you every day, won't you?"
"Of course, you dear goose," Katherine assured, her blue eyes misting
over with sudden tears. It was so wonderful to be loved and missed. "I
shall not be in bed for two whole weeks. I can sit up a little now and I
am so strong I shall be walking about the room by the last of this week.
I am not used to being an invalid and I don't intend to get used to
being one."
Naturally sturdy of constitution, the end of the ensuing week found
Katherine able to make little journeys about her room. It was not until
the Friday following her accident that she felt equal to seeing Leslie
Cairns. The nurse had informed her on Thursday that Miss Langly would be
able to see her for a few minutes on Friday afternoon. Leslie
accordingly cut her last afternoon recitation in order to call on
Katherine before any of her friends should arrive on the scene.
"Good afternoon," she saluted without enthusiasm, as the nurse admitted
her to the sick room. Her small dark eyes shrewdly appraised Katherine,
who was lying on her couch bed clad in a dainty delft blue silk kimono.
"Good afternoon, Miss Cairns," Katherine returned. "Please take the arm
chair. It is more comfortable than the others."
"Thank you. I can't stay long. I have been trying to see you for the
last week; ever since your accident, in fact. Glad to see you better. I
sent you some fruit and flowers. Tried to make you understand that I was
anxious about you." Leslie paused. Her small stock of politeness was
already threatening to desert her. She despised Katherine for her
poverty. Now she disliked her even more because she had injured her.
"I thank you for the fruit and flowers. I asked the nurse to thank you
for me when I received them. I have met with so many kindnesses since
I--since I was hurt." Katherine referred to the injury she had received
through Leslie's recklessness with some hesitancy.
"You understand, don't you, that I wasn't really to blame for your
accident?" The question was put to Katherine with brusque directness. "I
was driving a little faster than usual to escape the storm. I was well
within the speed limit. Remember that. I fail to understand why you
girls didn't hear my horn. It sounded clearly, even above the storm."
"I did not hear it." Katherine fixed her clear eyes squarely upon the
other girl. "I heard Jerry scream 'Look out!' and then the car struck
me."
"Hm! Well, all I can say is you girls should not have been strung across
the road as you were," was Leslie's bold criticism.
"We were walking only on the half of the road used by cars coming toward
us," was Katherine's quietly defensive rejoinder. "But it doesn't
matter, Miss Cairns. I do not intend to make any trouble for you. I hope
all excitement of the accident has died down before this."
"It will be dropped unless that crowd of girls you go with keep stirring
it up," retorted Leslie. "I wish you would ask them to let it drop.
Since you are willing to, why shouldn't they be? I wasn't to blame.
Start an inquiry and the result will be we'll not be allowed to keep
our cars at college. That will hit some of your friends as well as
myself and mine."
"I give you my word that I shall drop the matter. I know my friends have
no desire to keep it active. I say this in their defense. I cannot allow
you to misunderstand or belittle their principles."
Katherine spoke with marked stiffness. She could endure Leslie's
supercilious manner toward herself. When it came to laying the fault at
the door of her beloved friends--that was not to be borne.
"I'm not in the least interested in your friends. All I want them to do
is to mind their own business about this accident. If you say they will,
I look to you to keep your word. If you will accept a money settlement,
say what you want and I will hand you a check for that amount." Leslie
made this offer with cool insolence.
"Please don't!" Katherine was ready to cry with weakness and hurt pride.
"I--won't you look upon the whole affair as though it had not happened?
Money is the last thing to be thought of."
"Very well; since that is your way of looking at it." Leslie rose. She
experienced a malicious satisfaction in having thus "taken a rise out of
the beggar." Her point gained, she was anxious to be gone. "Hope you
will soon be as well as ever. If you need anything, let me know. I must
hurry along. I have a very important dinner engagement this evening.
Goodbye."
She made a hasty exit, without offering her hand in farewell. Katherine
lay back among her pillows with a long sigh of sheer relief. She felt
that she could not have endured her caller two minutes longer without
telling her frankly how utterly she detested her.
Marjorie and Jerry coming cheerily in upon her soon after classes, she
confided to them the news of Leslie's call.
"The idea," sniffed Jerry. "Wish I had been here. I'd have told Miss
Bully Cairns where she gets off at. How does she know but that President
Matthews knows about it already? There were several freshies in her car.
No doubt they were all her sort or they wouldn't have been with her.
Look at the freshies in Miss Stephens' car. They were the first on the
scene and were awfully sweet to us. What would hinder any one of them
from 'stirring things up' if they disapproved of the way Miss Cairns
acted? I mean the way she took her time about coming back after she ran
Katherine down. She had better make the rounds of the college and tell
everyone to keep quiet about it."
"She knows she is entirely in the wrong," said Marjorie sternly.
"Further, she has not told the truth. I am sure I would have heard a
horn if she had sounded one. She was certainly exceeding the speed
limit, and she did not keep her car to the proper side of the road. So
long as Katherine wishes the matter dropped, her wish is law in the
matter."