MOSS
One morning a couple of weeks later, Patricia was wakened suddenly by a
marshmallow landing on her nose and scattering its fine, powdered sugar
all over her face. Sitting up quickly, she saw through her open door Ruth
and Jane in their room across the hall, sitting on their beds, doubled up
with laughter.
“You fiends!” she cried softly. “Just you wait!”
“What’s the matter?” inquired Betty sleepily, from the other bed, without
even opening her eyes.
“Those Goths across the hall threw a marshmallow in my face!” replied
Patricia, seizing the unfortunate bit of confectionery and returning it
with such good aim that it struck Jane’s hand and bounded off onto the
rug, where it deposited the rest of its sugar.
“Get up, Lazy Bones!” ordered Jane. “We’ve got to go out for moss before
breakfast.”
“I forgot all about it,” groaned Patricia. “I wish that botany class was
in Hades.”
“I wish you’d all shut up,” complained Betty. “I want to sleep; and,
thank Heaven, I don’t take botany.”
Patricia was soon ready, and the three girls stole softly down the hall
and tried the front door.
“Who’s that?” called Mrs. Vincent, who slept, not only with her door
open, but also, so the girls said, with her eyes and ears wide as well.
“Patricia, Ruth, and Jane going out for moss for botany class,” answered
Jane. “We’ll be back before breakfast time.”
“Don’t go far away.”
“Does she think we can find moss on the fire escape?” demanded Jane
scornfully.
“Just where _are_ we going?” asked Patricia.
“I think we’ll cut through the back yard here into Foth Road and head out
toward the country.”
They went around the side of the dormitory, and, to their surprise, saw
Rhoda coming toward them across the back yard.
“Aren’t you up pretty early, Rhoda?” asked Jane casually, as the girl
flushed and looked embarrassed.
“Not so very,” was the low reply. “I often run out here for a breath of
fresh air before starting my work.”
“How fussed she acted,” commented Ruth, “just as if she’d been caught
doing something she didn’t want anybody to know about.”
“Yes, I noticed that too,” said Patricia, carefully following her
companions down the treacherous, broken stone ledges into the yard behind
Arnold Hall.
“Why, Ruth,” cried Jane, “‘Big House’ is occupied! I didn’t know that;
did you?” The girl regarded in surprise the three-story brick house
across a narrow stretch of green lawn.
“No, I didn’t”—adding softly, “Come on; somebody is watching us from that
bay window on the second floor.”
“How do you know?” demanded Jane, hurrying after her room mate.
“I saw a woman’s hand pull the curtain aside a little while we were
waiting for Pat to come down the steps.”
“It’s a shame to spoil our short cut to Foth Road; for I suppose we can’t
go through there any more. That house was empty all last year,” explained
Jane, turning to Patricia, “which made it rather nice for us because,
besides using the yard as a thoroughfare, we sometimes had little parties
there or met our boy friends when we didn’t want to go out the front way
with them. Oh, I assure you it was useful in lots of ways.”
They were out on the road by then, and walking briskly toward the
country.
“We’ll never find any moss if we keep to the road,” objected Ruth, after
they had walked a mile in vain. “I should think we’d have to go into the
woods, see, over there.”
“Not I!” replied Jane. “I’m too afraid of snakes.”
Patricia laughed. “There aren’t any snakes in a pine woods. They’re
mostly where there are lots of rocks.”
“Well, anyway we’ll go a little farther and then I, for one, take to the
woods,” decided Ruth. “We’ve got to find some moss soon, and go home; and
I won’t face Yates again with no specimens.”
“Isn’t he the old pill, though?” said Jane to Patricia. “Did you ever see
anybody so cold and stone-like? Even when he says unpleasant things—and,
oh, boy! can’t he be disagreeable when he likes!—his face never changes
from that set, gloomy expression.”
“He certainly is most peculiar,” agreed Patricia, “and I don’t like him
even _any_! For that matter, no love at all is lost between us; something
in the way he looks at me tells me that.”
“Ah, here we are!” exclaimed Jane, pointing to an old shed a few feet
from the road. On its roof, near the ridge pole, was a luxuriant growth
of bright green moss.
“How can we get at it?” asked Ruth, as they scrambled across a wire fence
and crossed a stretch of rough, coarse grass. “I’m no good at climbing.”
“Nor I,” said Ruth. “How about you, Pat?”
“I think I could get up far enough to reach it, if you girls will boost a
bit,” replied Patricia.
“It’s O. K. with us, but for Heaven’s sake be as quiet as possible. We
don’t want the dog set on us.”
“Oh, nobody’s around so early as this; there’s no window on this side of
the shed, and the door is on the other. The farm house is back of that
clump of trees.”
“Easy telling you don’t know anything about the country,” said Jane
scornfully; “these farmers get up early.”
Stepping up on a log, which happened to lie conveniently close to the
building, Patricia, with the aid of the girls, got a firm grip on the
edge of the roof and drew herself up to a point where she could lie flat
on its weather-worn boards and stretch her long arms up toward the
coveted plants. With much effort, she succeeded in reaching the moss and
in tearing up two big handfuls. Resting on her elbows for a moment to
ease the strain on her arms, she was horrified to feel the boards
underneath them begin to sag; and, with a dull splintering of ancient
wood, her hands and lower arms disappeared into a yawning cavity.
Simultaneously, the moss dropped from her fingers into the depths below.
A snort, a gasp, and a forceful exclamation from within the shed mingled
with Patricia’s startled cry of “Girls, I’m falling in.”
“What shall we do? What shall we do?” demanded Ruth excitedly as
Patricia, speechless with horror, gazed down through the hole over which
she hung, and met the cold, grey eyes of Professor Yates! His immaculate
shoulders and smooth black hair were covered with bits of moss.
“Pull me down, quick!” cried the horrified Patricia, finally recovering
the power of speech.
“It will spoil your dress,” warned Jane.
“I don’t care! Get me down, for Pete’s sake!” retorted Patricia wildly.
With their united efforts, the two girls succeeded in dragging Patricia
safely to the ground, minus the moss, and with several long scratches on
her arms.
“Where’s the moss?” demanded Ruth in surprise.
“All over Professor Yates!” gasped Patricia, hysterically.
“What?” cried Ruth, while Jane looked as if she feared Patricia had lost
her mind.
“He’s in that shed!”
“You’re crazy!” retorted Jane, feeling her pulse.
“Honest to goodness! Cross my heart!”
At that moment, the object of their discussion strolled around the corner
of the shed. He had brushed himself off, and now looked as calm and neat
as if he were in his classroom. His gaze traveled coldly from one to
another, then, looking directly at Patricia, he drawled: “To what am I
indebted for this most unconventional call?”
“To your demand for specimens of moss today ‘without fail,’” quoted Jane
glibly.
“A most novel situation, stealing it from my own roof, and ruining the
roof in the bargain.”
“We had no idea it was your roof,” retorted Patricia hotly, “and I had no
intention of breaking through it. It was anything but a pleasant
experience, I assure you.”
“Of course we expect to assume any expense involved,” put in Jane
soothingly, as they turned to go.
Professor Yates made no reply, but stood watching them scramble over the
fence and start down the road toward college.
“Wasn’t that just terrible?” gasped Patricia “I’m certainly done for with
him now. Next time I do any climbing for specimens, you’ll know it.”
“Whatever do you suppose he was doing out there?” demanded Ruth.
“You heard him say it was his roof, didn’t you?” retorted Jane. “Clarice
said once that he had an old place where he raises all kinds of truck for
the lab, but I didn’t pay much attention to her. She talks so much that
half the time I don’t listen very attentively; and I haven’t given it a
thought since.”
“Just wait until the girls hear about it!”
“We’re going to have a spread tonight; did you know it?” asked Jane.
“Doll’s going out with one of her boy friends.”
“The dark youth who’s a ‘special’ in some year or other?” asked Patricia.
“Yes.”
“She’ll have to keep better tabs on him,” commented Ruth; “he’s a born
flirt. I was at the Black Book the other night when he came in, and he
tried to make a date with me.”
“Did he succeed?” asked Jane mischievously.
“He did _not_! I can’t bear him.”
“Do you realize, girls,” inquired Ruth, “that we are still moss-less?”
“Yes, and we’ll continue to be, so far as I am concerned,” retorted
Patricia.
“Oh, somebody in the lab will be sure to have some,” said Jane easily,
“and we’ll just borrow a little of it. I don’t feel equal to hunting any
longer.”
The spread was about to get under way at eight-thirty that evening. Mrs.
Vincent and her youthful escort, Ivan Zahn, had departed for a concert
which the college was giving to entertain the Freshman Class. Rhoda was
looking after the Black Book and the telephone; so the girls were quite
free to enjoy themselves, without responsibility. The new maid had
quickly become as much of a favorite as her predecessor; for she was
accommodating and good-tempered, and the inhabitants of Arnold Hall,
especially those on the first floor, treated her almost as one of
themselves.
“Did anybody telephone the Varsity Coffee Shoppe for the eats?” demanded
Hazel, coming out into the hall in a suit of bright red lounging pajamas.
“Yes,” answered Jane from her room, where she was putting frantic last
minute lines on a poster which was due the next morning.
“Who took the order?” asked Frances, rushing in to borrow some thread to
run up a rip in her coolie coat.
“Al, and he said he’d send them right down,” contributed Ruth from her
bed, where she lay on her back trying to fix an important bit of
psychology in her mind.
“Oh, cut the study!” ordered Anne, entering with Lucile, Betty, and
Patricia.
“Got to get this tonight,” cried Ruth, hanging onto the book which Anne
tried to take out of her hands.
“No, you haven’t; get up early in the morning and do it. Then it will be
all the fresher in your mind.”
“Yes, you like early rising,” laughed Betty.
Anne continued to pull, and finally got Ruth off the bed. Katharine, who
came in at that moment, attracted by the noise, slipped past Ruth and
Anne, flopped into the recently vacated bed, and pulled up the covers.
“Of all things!” exclaimed Ruth indignantly, jerking away from Anne. “Get
out of my bed!”
Katharine extended a long, strong arm and pulled Betty in beside her,
while Frances piled in on the other side.
“Safety in numbers,” laughed Katharine impishly. “Get us out if you can!”
“I’ll help you, Ruth!” shouted Clarice, dashing in with a glass of water
which she sprinkled freely on the three girls in the bed. With a cry of
protest they sprang up and chased Clarice the length of the hall where
she barricaded herself with a heavy chair in the corner beside the
telephone booth. At the other end of the hall, on a couple of
well-stuffed white laundry bags which were ready for the collector in the
morning, perched Hazel, swinging her red-clad legs and singing: “I want a
drink! Kathy wants a drink! Francy wants a drink!”
“Here’s Al, girls!” called Clarice from her vantage point, where she
could see out onto the street.
The feud was forgotten, as they all trooped forward to relieve Rhoda of
the basket which the boy had brought. Sitting down on the runner which
extended the length of the hall, the girls quickly disposed of orangeade,
sandwiches, cakes, and ice cream, not forgetting to give Rhoda a share. A
songfest followed, and a general romp the length of the alley was in full
swing when the front door opened suddenly and Mrs. Vincent walked in,
alone.
“Girls!” she cried sharply. “Stop that noise at once! You sound like a
lot of hyenas! I could hear you up to the corner!”
“What brought her home so early?” muttered Betty to Patricia.
“Must have had a scrap with Ivan,” whispered Anne. “She’s so cross.”
Just then the telephone rang, and Mrs. Vincent paused to gaze hopefully
at Rhoda who answered it.
“Yes,” said Rhoda, in a low tone. “Yes, I’ll call her.”
With an oddly excited expression on her usually calm face, Rhoda turned
to Mrs. Vincent, saying, “Someone wants to speak with you.”