THE LITTLE RIFT
"What do you think?" cried Patricia radiantly, swooping down on Elinor
as she came slowly out of the portrait room at high noon on the
momentous Tuesday. "What _do_ you think, Elinor Kendall? I've gotten
'Honorable Mention' for my silly little old head! Isn't it wonderful?
I'm so stunned I can't talk. I never dreamed it could have the ghost
of a show," she rattled on ecstatically. "Miss Green was paralyzed,
and Naskowski kept nodding till I thought he'd loosen his brain, and
Griffin--she got first prize you know--cheered right out loud before
them all. I was simply too limp for words, and I rushed out to tell
you right away."
Elinor's eyes filled with a glad light, and she took Patricia in her
arms. "It's perfectly glorious, Miss Pat, darling," she said with a
rapturous squeeze. "I'm so delighted I can't help kissing you on the
spot," and she did it with a heartiness that made Patricia wriggle.
"Ouch, that's my loose wisdom-tooth you're pushing against!" she
protested plaintively. "You've wobbled it all out of place, you
reckless thing. There goes the crowd into the first antique. Come
along or we'll be too late!"
The doors of the exhibition room were pushed quickly open as Mr. Benton
led the expectant band of students in for their first sight of the
prize designs, and Patricia's heart beat fast with the thrilling hope
that Elinor's might be among the first in rank.
Her eyes swept one wall and then the other, searching for the familiar
canvas, but all in vain, until she lifted them to the screen which
stood in the center of the room, and where three canvases were hung,
Elinor's below the other two.
"There it is!" she whispered eagerly, nudging Elinor to make her see.
"It's on the screen. Oh, Norn, it _must_ have----"
"Hush!" said Elinor in an undertone. "Don't make a fuss. There's
Doris Leighton waving to us from the model stand. She looks awfully
well, doesn't she? Her little vacation----"
But Patricia was impatiently deaf. "Why doesn't he get on?" she
whispered testily. "We know all about the conditions of the prize.
What we want to know is--oh, Elinor, I'm horribly disappointed. I was
afraid Doris Leighton would get it, but you ought to have had Honorable
Mention. Griffin's isn't half so good as yours; she said so herself.
Can you see what their canvases are like? I'm just so that the light
glares on them for me. What's that he's saying now? He's talking
about your study."
The words cut the air with an incisive clearness that left no shadow of
a doubt, though Patricia could scarcely credit her own ears.
"I regret to say that the third study on the screen," said Mr. Benton,
toying with his eyeglass ribbon, "is merely placed there as a warning
to students of all classes to stick to their own ideas and
imaginations, and not to attempt the hazardous task of copying stronger
and more experienced workers. This canvas shows so much delicacy of
appreciation of the subject that, had no other of absolutely the same
design been previously turned in earlier, the jury should have given it
the prize. Miss Leighton's cleverly executed study of precisely the
same subject, while more finished in treatment, is far below this one
in feeling, and it is a matter of regret to me that the student who
executed it should not have possessed more originality and
self-reliance. Miss Leighton will please come forward to receive the
Roberts prize."
Of what followed--the bestowing and graceful acceptance of the pretty
purse with the hundred dollars, the congratulations and murmurs of
surprise that ran about the assembly--Patricia had little knowledge.
Those astonishing words of Mr. Benton had so stung and bewildered her
that the room swung about her dizzily and she clutched the back of a
chair for support. Elinor's stricken face faded in the blurred
background of all the other faces, as she flung out vain hands of
protest.
"Oh, it isn't fair--" she broke out, but the words that boomed so
loudly in her ears were only a faint whisper, and she staggered blindly
for a moment.
When she recovered herself in the dim corridor, Elinor, calm and
reassuring, was on one side of her, while her other arm was in the firm
grip of the cheery Griffin.
"That's all right, old pal," Griffin encouraged her. "You're almost
into port now. Keep a stiff upper lip till we land you."
Patricia saw that they were steering for the dressing-room couch, and
meekly allowed them their way.
"Now you're safe and sound, with no bones broken," said Griffin, as
Patricia sank down on the roomy couch. "You're a nice one, you are,
scaring us into a blue fit just when we were about to blister our paws
with applause for the heroine of the day."
Patricia looked inquiringly at Elinor, who smiled at her serenely in
return, much to Patricia's bewilderment.
"But," she protested, raising herself on one elbow. "It wasn't true,
what Mr. Benton said about your design. Why don't you tell him so,
Elinor?"
Elinor merely shook her head gently, while Griffin stood in embarrassed
silence.
"Why don't you _do_ something?" cried Patricia again. "Why don't you
tell him? Griffin, it wasn't true--that she copied it! You know she'd
not do a thing like that!"
"Any fool knows that," replied Griffin gruffly. "If Leighton had any
stuff in her, she'd have spoken up. I was just going to when I saw you
begin to crumple. It wasn't etiquette for me to speak, but I'd have
given them something to think of!"
"It's too late now to bother about denying it, Miss Pat dear," said
Elinor soothingly. "It doesn't really matter much, you know, since we
three know I didn't copy. After all, it's a very little thing. I'd
rather be blamed unjustly than have done such a poor act. Don't feel
so badly about it, dear. We can tell our friends that it was a mistake
on Mr. Benton's part, and they'll believe us, I'm sure. It doesn't
matter for the rest."
"Doesn't it, really?" blazed Patricia, sitting up very stiff and
straight. "Well, it may not to you, but to my mind it's as bad as
telling any other untruth. You're not guilty of it, and if you let the
accusation pass unnoticed, you are party to the falsehood."
Griffin, who was winking at her behind Elinor's back in a particularly
portentous fashion, turned to the door.
"Calm down, Miss Pat," she said, with her hand on the knob. "I'm going
to corral a few of the elect and put it to them. Brace up and look
pleasant by the time I get back."
Patricia was about to break into angry tears on Elinor's neck, but the
brisk and significant air with which Griffin spoke roused her to
herself again. She put Elinor's arms away, and going to the mirror,
smoothed her tumbled hair, and whisked away the telltale traces of her
collapse, while Elinor sat quietly on the edge of the couch watching
her with fond anxiety.
Not a word was spoken till the door opened again, and Griffin with
Doris Leighton and Miss Green came quickly in.
Doris Leighton, who was flushed and animated, went directly up to
Elinor.
"It's a shame," she said, with a marked effort to subdue her own
complacency. "Everybody knows you are much too conscientious to do
such a thing. I've told everybody how shocked I am that Mr. Benton
should make such a horrid mistake. It's simply a thought wave, and
I've told everyone that you're not at all to blame."
Elinor looked at her very calmly, and said with a tinge of amusement in
her level voice, "You must be very thankful that you got your study in
first, for then you would have had to congratulate me instead of
commiserating me."
Patricia felt rather ashamed of Elinor's lack of response to what she
considered Doris' loyal support, and she broke out gratefully, "You'll
tell them all, won't you? They'll soon understand if you tell them!"
She had her reward in Doris' dazzling smile, and her assurances that
she would do all she could to make Elinor's vindication speedy and
thorough.
Elinor was more cordial to Miss Green's solemn and indignant protest
against the powers that be. The stout monitor had so much genuine good
feeling that the sincerity of her wrath could not be doubted.
"It is most unfair, unfair, Miss Kendall," she reiterated, with her two
dewlaps solemnly wagging to and fro. "It is most unprofessional of Mr.
Benton, and, even if you had copied (which of course no one dreams of
saying), it would still be most indelicate to expose a student directly
to the publicity of such a reprimand. I deplore it. I deplore it most
heartily. And your manner of receiving the unmerited rebuke has made
me admire you more than I can say."
Elinor thanked her with pretty gratitude.
"I shall make it a personal matter to report to the committee," said
Miss Green, as she prepared to follow the vanishing skirts of the prize
bearer. "I shall certainly bring the matter to their notice before the
next meeting," and with a cordial shake of Elinor's hand she sailed
out, with her black cloak billowing behind her and her plume quivering
with suppressed indignation.
"Isn't she the good old sport?" cried Griffin, in lively admiration.
"She'll do the work of a half dozen niminy-piminy dolls like Leighton.
Margaret Howes and your humble servant will back her up, too, and that
committee will sit up and take notice before it's a week older, or my
name's not Virginia Althea Frigilla Griffin--just like that."
It was hard work later on, when they had to face the inquiries of the
wrathful Judith, to convince her that the whole thing was not a plot
against Elinor by some envious rival.
"Mark my words, Elinor Kendall," she said impressively. "Some one is
at the bottom of this, and I have my suspicions, too, who that someone
is. I'm not going to tell, for you girls always laugh at me, but I'm
going to prove it to you before that committee meets that you're the
victim of a conspiracy."
The relish with which Judith pronounced these ominous words made Elinor
smile, but Patricia felt only aggravation at what she considered airs
on Judith's part.
"Stuff and nonsense, Judy!" she said, impatiently. "You've been
soaking your brain in fiction till you can't see straight. Don't you
meddle with Elinor's affairs unless she gives you permission. You'll
only make her ridiculous."
Judith, ignoring Patricia's pungent remarks, turned her calm eyes
inquiringly to Elinor.
"You don't mind if I can help prove that someone else was the deceiver,
do you, Elinor?" she asked with such seriousness that Elinor rippled
with enjoyment:
"Bless your heart, kitten, make yourself as happy as you please with my
affairs; only, I beseech of you, do it quietly and with as little
martial music as possible."
Judith pulled herself free from Elinor's circling arms and made for the
door, pausing on the threshold.
"As if I'd publish it on the housetops!" she cried in infinite disdain.
"It's plain you aren't much up in detective stories."
After their laughter at her dramatic disappearance had died down, they
sat quietly in the twilight watching the lamps flicker into life across
the park, each one busy with her own thoughts.
"Do you know, Miss Pat," said Elinor, breaking a long silence "that I
don't like Doris Leighton any more. It isn't because she got the
prize--you know me better than to think that--but I've been noticing
her more closely recently and I don't think she rings true."
"Oh, I wish you wouldn't, Norn," protested Patricia, in a small voice.
"I do so want to have her for a friend. She's so lovely and talented
and attractive. What is the matter with her now that you say such
things? You didn't use to feel like that."
Elinor hesitated. "I don't know," she replied slowly, measuring her
words. "I can't put my finger on it, but she doesn't seem the same to
me as she did at first. She isn't jealous of my poor work, of course,
but I can feel a something--a wall or barrier--that she raises up
between us whenever my work is spoken of. I felt it when we talked
about the subject of the prize designs, and I felt it today more
clearly than ever. We can't be friends any more as we were, I'm
afraid. Something has come between us. 'The little rift within the
lute,'" she quoted sorrowfully.
"'That by and by will make the music mute,'" ended Patricia dismally.
"Oh, I hope not, Norn. I hope it'll all turn out well and we can go on
pleasantly and peaceably for the rest of the term. I hate rows and
suspicions. I'd like to live 'in charity and love to all men,' but I'm
always getting into scrapes. I no sooner learn to like a person than
they turn out to be fakes."
"I haven't gone that far," Elinor gently reminded her. "I didn't mean
to say that Doris Leighton was a fake. I only meant that my feelings
toward her had changed. You don't have to give up your admiration for
her, Pat dear."
Patricia shook her head slowly from side to side. "'Whither thou goest
I will go,'" she quoted. "I won't have her for a friend if she gives
you the creeps, Norn, and you know it. I've been mistaken in people
before, but you've always been the same old true blue. You and Miss
Jinny know better than I do, and I give in. I won't be an enemy--you
wouldn't want that--but I won't be a real friend like I have been,
doing errands and helping her stretch canvases and all that. You and I
will stand together always, old lady, and if the Roberts prize has done
nothing but show us how very nice we each think the other is, it will
have had its uses as far as we are concerned."
They sat in comfortable silence till they heard the front door slam and
Judith's feet on the stair.
"I wonder what that young monkey is up to?" laughed Patricia as they
heard Judith moving about in her room, preparing for dinner with the
alacrity of hungry virtue. "She won't let on for the world, but I know
she's feeling mighty important about something. I can tell by the way
she whisks about that she's enjoying herself immensely."