THE SHADOW CLUB IN DISGRACE
"THE president wishes to see the members of the Shadow Club in his
office immediately. They will please pass out before we proceed with the
opening exercises."
That was the announcement Professor Fowler made in chapel next morning,
and a clap of thunder from a clear sky could not have been more
unexpected or more startling in its effect. A frightened silence
pervaded the room so deep that every girl could hear her heart beat. A
message to Doctor Wells's office at that hour was almost unheard of. He
always conducted the chapel exercises himself. It must be a matter of
grave importance indeed that would cause his absence now, and the
sending of such a message.
Lloyd and Betty exchanged startled glances, then slowly rose, followed
by Allison and Kitty. Katie stood up next and looked back with a giggle
at Lucy, Retta, Rose and Dora, who, being only of the Order of W. V.'s,
hesitated to follow. But emphatic beckonings brought them to their feet,
and they filed out into the hall after the other girls, their heads held
high, and smiling as if indifferent to the whisperings around them.
But the instant the door closed upon them and they found themselves
alone in the hall outside, they began demanding of each other the reason
for the summons.
"You needn't ask _me_!" exclaimed Lucy. "We didn't do a thing last night
on our side of the building. I've no more idea than a chipmunk why we
were sent for."
"Nothing happened in our wing," protested Betty and Lloyd, in the same
breath.
"Oh, girls, I'm all in a shake!" exclaimed Retta Long, almost in tears.
"It frightens me nearly to death to think of being called up before the
president. Such a thing never happened to me before, nor to any of our
family."
"Oh, boo!" exclaimed Kitty, with a reassuring smile. "We haven't done
anything so killing bad that we need care. We've only had a little fun.
Come on! I'm not afraid of all the king's horses and all the king's
men."
But in spite of her brave words she sat down as shyly as the rest of
them when Doctor Wells, tall and commanding, motioned them to seats in
front of his desk. He looked so big and dignified, standing before them
erect and silent, while he waited for them to be seated, that her
courage failed her. But when he sat down in his armchair and looked
gravely from one frightened face to the other, Kitty saw a twinkle in
the kind eyes behind the spectacles which reassured her.
"We caught a ghost in the seminary last night, young ladies," he began,
abruptly, with a smile twitching an instant at the corners of his mouth.
It was only for an instant. His face was unusually grave as he
proceeded. "It was just in time to prevent a very serious occurrence
which would have been a great calamity to the school. It made a partial
confession which implicated some one in your club, and I have sent for
you in order that you may clear yourselves at once. Most of your
mischief has been only innocent amusement, I know, but I must have a
complete history of the club, from the beginning six weeks ago, up till
twelve o'clock last night."
At mention of a ghost, they looked at each other with startled faces,
wondering how much he already knew. Evidently some one outside of the
club had been playing their own game, and they wondered who could have
made a confession which could truthfully have included them.
Instinctively they turned to Betty to be their spokesman. With her
truthful brown eyes looking straight into the doctor's, Betty clasped
her hands in her lap and gave a simple account of the club.
She began with the verse Miss Edith had written in their albums, and the
story she had told them of the girls who walked forty miles to the
mountain school. She told of the impulse it had awakened in them to do
something for the mountain people, and the club that had grown out of
that desire.
"We didn't intend to play any pranks in the beginning," she said; "all
we wanted to do was to cast our shadow-selves where we could never be.
But just after Hallowe'en we met in our room one Saturday afternoon, and
a girl hid in the closet next to ours and heard all our secrets and went
and told them, and we decided to shadow _her_ awhile, to punish her for
being so mean. But one-half of the club lived outside the seminary, and
Ida Shane resigned about that time, so we established a new order, and
took these four girls in as Wraiths of Vengeance." She nodded toward the
new members.
A grim smile flitted across the doctor's face as he listened to her
explanation of their duties, and heard the use they had made of Lot's
wife and the magic lantern. But he smoothed his white moustache to cover
his amusement, and when she finished he sat in deep thought a moment,
his brows drawn closely together.
"If there was any ghost around last night, we weren't responsible for
its doings," she added. "It didn't belong to the club."
"Why did Ida Shane resign?" he asked, suddenly.
"I don't know, sir," answered Betty. "She wouldn't tell."
"There must have been a reason," he continued, sternly. "Do you know,
Kitty?"
"No, sir."
"Do you, Katie?"
"No, sir."
The same question and the same answer passed down the line until it came
to Lloyd. She blushed a vivid scarlet and hesitated.
"Yes, I know," she exclaimed. "But I am not at liberty to tell."
The president held out part of a torn envelope, on which was written
with many flourishes in a bold, masculine hand, "Lloydsboro Seminary.
Kindness of bearer."
"Have any of you seen this handwriting before?" he asked.
The envelope was passed from hand to hand, each girl shaking her head in
denial, until it came to Lloyd. With a sick sinking of heart she
recognized the familiar penmanship that had been such a bugbear, and
which she had hoped never to see again. All the colour faded from her
face as she faintly acknowledged that it was familiar.
"That is all," he said, carelessly tossing the paper back on the desk.
"I am glad to find that the club, as a club, is in no way accountable
for the affair that I mentioned. I shall have to forbid any more games
of ghost, however, and must ask the owners of the magic lantern to take
their property home."
He kept them a moment longer, with a few earnest words which they never
could forget, they were so fatherly, so helpful, and inspiring. They
went away with a higher value of the motive of their little club and its
power to influence others; and an earnest purpose to measure up to the
high standard he set for them, made them quiet and thoughtful all that
morning.
"Just a moment, please, Lloyd," he said, as she was about to pass out
with the others. "There's another matter about which I wish to speak to
you."
She dropped into her seat again. When the last girl had passed out,
closing the door behind her, he picked up the scrap of envelope again,
saying, "I must ask you one more question, Lloyd. _Where_ have you seen
this handwriting before?"
She looked up at him imploringly. "Oh, please, Doctah Wells," she
begged, "don't ask me! I'm not at liberty to tell that, eithah. I
promised that I wouldn't, on my honah, you know."
"But it is imperative that I should know," he answered, sternly. "You
are here in my charge, and I have the right to demand an answer."
"I am in honah bound not to tell," she repeated, a trifle defiantly,
although her lips quivered. "It would get some one else into trouble,
and I have to refuse, even if you expel me for it."
The doctor and the old Colonel had been friends since their youth, and
he recognized the "Lloyd stubbornness" now in the firmly set mouth and
the poise of the head.
"My dear child," he said, kindly, seeing a tear begin to steal from
under her long lashes. "It is for your own sake, in the absence of your
parents, and for the sake of the school's reputation, that I am obliged
to make these inquiries. The somebody whom you are trying to shield is
already in trouble, and your telling or not telling can make no
difference now."
Lloyd looked up in alarm.
"Yes, it was Ida Shane whom the matron discovered trying to steal out of
the seminary last night. Ned Bannon was waiting outside to take her on
the fast express to Cincinnati. They were to have been married there
this morning at his cousin's had they not been interrupted in their
plans."
Lloyd gave a gasp, and the tree outside the window seemed to be going
round and round.
"We have telegraphed for her aunt. She will be here this afternoon to
take her home, and the affair will be ended as far as the seminary is
concerned. Now what I must know, is just what connection have you had
with it. Ida confessed that a member of the Shadow Club had helped her
carry on a clandestine correspondence for awhile, but for some reason
suddenly refused to be the bearer of their letters any longer. It was
for that reason, she said, feeling that her only friend had failed her,
that she consented to the elopement, which happily has been prevented."
"Oh, Doctah Wells! Do _you_ think I am to blame for it?" cried Lloyd,
wishing that the ground would open and swallow her if he should say yes.
"It was so hard to know what to do! It neahly broke my heart to refuse
her, but--it was this way."
With the tears running down her face she poured out the whole story,
from the beginning of her devotion to Ida, to the day when, under her
grandmother's portrait she fought the battle between her love for her
friend and loyalty to the family honour.
"There wasn't anybody to tell me," she sobbed at the last. "And if I was
wrong and am to blame for Ida's running away, nobody will evah trust me
again!"
A very tender smile flashed across the doctor's stern face and the eyes
gleamed through the spectacles with a kinder light than she had ever
seen in them, as he leaned forward to say:
"I have known George Lloyd many, many years, my child, and I want to say
that he has never had more reason to be proud of anything in his life
than that his little granddaughter, under such a test, recognized the
right and stood true to the traditions of an old and honourable family
when it cost her a friendship that she held very dear. Just now Ida
feels that she has been cruelly used, and that her happiness is wrecked
for life; but in time she will see differently. Poor mistaken child! I
talked with her this morning. Ned is only a selfish, overgrown boy, with
many bad habits, and like many another of his kind knows that the plea
that she is reforming him is the strongest argument he can use in
influencing her. He tells her she is doing that, but to my certain
knowledge he has not given up a single vice since he has known her. She
thinks that it is her duty to cling to him. I admire her devotion in one
way, but it makes her blind to every other duty. She is too infatuated
to be able to judge between the right and wrong, and at present feels
bitter toward the whole world.
"But by and by, when she grows wiser and learns that the judgment of a
sixteen-year-old girl in such matters cannot safely be trusted, she will
be glad that you helped bring the affair to a crisis. When she has
outgrown her infatuation she will see that you have done her a kindness
instead of a wrong, and she will thank you deeply."
Lloyd had not felt so light-hearted for days, as when she left the
president's office, both on her own account and Ida's. When she went
into the class-room it was with such a bright face that every one felt
the message to the Shadow Club must have been some mark of especial
honour.
When Doctor Wells thought the affair ended as far as the seminary was
concerned, he had not taken the newspapers into account.
No one could guess where they got their information. Friday morning a
Louisville paper came out to the Valley with startling headlines:
"_Pretty Schoolgirl at Lloydsboro Valley Attempts to Elope with Son of
Prominent Judge! Granddaughter of Well-Known Kentucky Colonel Plays
Important Part! Shadow Club in Disgrace! Ghosts and Lovers vs. Good
Behaviour and Learning!_"
No names were mentioned, but the badly garbled account made a buzz of
wonder and criticism in the Valley. Doctor Wells came into chapel
looking worried and haggard. He simply stated the facts of the case and
held up the paper with the false account, speaking of the effect such a
report would have on the school.
"It puts us in a bad light," he said. "The public will say we should
have been more watchful. This will be copied all over the State before
the week is out. One girl has already been ordered home by telegraph on
account of it."
Lloyd did not see the paper until noon. She read it hastily, standing in
the hall, and then ran up to her room to throw herself across her bed in
a violent spell of crying.
"Oh, how could they tell such dreadful stories!" she sobbed to Betty.
"They might as well have published my name in big red lettahs as to have
described Locust and grandfathah so plainly that every one will know who
is meant. He and mothah will be so mawtified! I nevah want to look
anybody in the face again, aftah having such lies copied all ovah the
State about me, as Doctah Wells says they will be. I can't follow them
up and prove to everybody that they are not true, and it's such an awful
disgrace to be talked about that way in the papahs. If grandfathah or
Papa Jack were home I believe they'd shoot that horrid editah!"
The matron came in and tried to comfort her, but she would not listen.
She was in a nervous state when trifles were magnified into great
troubles, and she persisted in thinking that she was too disgraced by
the false report to ever appear in public again. Betty could not coax
her down to dinner, and it was not long before she had cried herself
into a throbbing headache.
Toward the middle of the afternoon, exhausted by her crying, she fell
into such a sound sleep that she did not hear the girls go tramping out
for their daily walk. Betty stole in and looked at her and went
sorrowfully out again. Magnolia Budine, passing the door with her
carpet-bag on the way to the old carryall waiting at the gate, stopped a
moment and listened. It was an exciting tale she was carrying home to
Roney this Friday afternoon. She was glad the sobs had ceased. She had
heard them at noon, and had gone around with the cloud of Lloyd's
trouble resting on her like a heavy burden.
It was nearly dark when Lloyd awoke. Some one was tapping at the door.
Before she could find her voice to say Come in, Mrs. Walton was standing
beside her. It was as if a burst of sunshine had suddenly brightened the
dull November twilight. Lloyd started to scramble up, but Mrs. Walton
insisted on her lying still. Sitting down on the side of the bed, she
began stroking her hot forehead with soft, motherly touches.
"I had a conversation with Doctor Wells over the telephone about that
affair in the paper," she began. "He told me what a state you were in
about it, so I immediately wrote to your mother a full explanation and
sent it off on the two o'clock train, stamped 'special delivery.' She'll
get it as soon as the paper, so put your mind at rest on that point. Now
I've come over to tell you something I found out about you the other
day. You don't even know it yourself. You'll be surprised and glad, I'm
sure. It's quite a story, so I shall have to begin it like one.
"One blustery day last week an old farmer stopped at Clovercroft and
asked to see Miss Katherine. It proved to be Magnolia Budine's father.
He had been there once before with a crock of apple-butter, which he
brought as a sort of thank-offering to Katherine because she had made
Magnolia so happy about the costume and the picture she took of her in
it.
"Katherine said he would have made a striking picture himself as he
stood there with his slouched hat pulled over his ears, a blue woollen
muffler wound around his neck, and an enormous bronze turkey gobbler in
his arms. He wouldn't go in at first, but finally stepped inside out of
the wind, still holding the turkey in his arms.
"It seems that there is a man living on his place who used to be an old
neighbour of the Budines when they lived near Loretta. This man has been
unable to work for some time, and is occupying the cabin free of rent.
He has a daughter about sixteen who is very ill. She is Magnolia's best
friend, and the child was afraid that Roney, as he called her, was going
to die. She wanted her picture above all things, and anything that
Magnolia wants the old fellow evidently makes an effort to get for her.
He seems completely wrapped up in her. So there he stood with his best
bronze gobbler in his arms and tears in his eyes, wanting to know of
Katherine if it would be a sufficient inducement for her to drive over
with him and take the sick girl's picture.
"She told him she never took pictures for pay, and said she would be
glad to do it for nothing if it were not such a bleak day that she was
afraid to ride so far in the cold. He was greatly distressed at his
failure to persuade her to go, for he was afraid that Roney might die
before the weather changed, and then his little girl would be so grieved
that she would never get over it. Katherine was so touched by the old
fellow's disappointment that she relented, and told him she would risk
the cold if I would be willing to go with her. They came by for me, and
I went.
"Oh, Lloyd, I wish you could have seen that poor, bare room where Roney
was lying. It was clean, but so pitifully bare of all that is bright and
comfortable. I looked around and saw not a picture except an unframed
chromo tacked over the mantel, till my eyes happened to rest on the old
wooden clock. There behind its glass door, swinging back and forth on
the pendulum, was _your_ picture; the Princess with the dove."
Lloyd raised herself on one elbow. "_My_ pictuah!" she cried, in
astonishment. "How did it get there?"
"That is what I couldn't help asking Roney. I wish you could have seen
her face light up as she looked at it. 'That's my Princess, Mrs.
Walton,' she said. 'Magnolia gave it to me. You don't know how she has
helped me through the long days and nights. Of course I can't see her in
the dark, but every time the clock ticks I know she is swinging away
there, saying, "For love--will find--a way."'
"I found that Roney's case is one for the King's Daughters to take in
hand. She has a small annuity left her by her mother's family; that is
all her father and she have to live on. That will stop at her death,
and it is her one anxiety that in spite of all her pain she may hang on
to life in order that her father may be provided for. The King's
Daughters sent for a specialist to come out and examine her. He says she
can be cured, so next week we are to move her into Louisville to a
hospital for treatment.
"You never saw such a happy face as hers when we told her. 'Oh,' she
cried, 'I almost gave up last week. The pain was so terrible. I couldn't
have borne it if I hadn't watched the pendulum and, every time it
ticked, said, "I'll stand it one more second for daddy's sake, and one
more, and one more; I'm spinning the golden thread like the Princess,
and love _will_ find a way to help me hang on a little longer!"'
"So you see, dear," said Mrs. Walton, with a playful pat of the cheek,
"your face and Betty's song brought hope and strength to a poor
suffering little soul of whom you never heard. Your shadow-self reached
a long, long way when it brought comfort to Roney and helped keep her
brave. What do you care for this trifle you are crying about? The whole
affair will blow over and be forgotten in a short time. Get up and go to
counting the pendulum with Roney, and sing like the real princess you
are. '_Love_ will find a way' to make us forget the unpleasant things
and remember only the good."
Lloyd sat up and threw both her arms around Mrs. Walton's neck. "You're
the real princess," she said, softly, with a kiss. "For you go about
doing good all the time, like a real king's daughtah."
"Now run along, little girl," said Mrs. Walton, gaily, as Lloyd slipped
off the bed. "Bathe your eyes and pack your satchel. I am going to take
you and Betty home with me to stay until Monday morning."