"THE CHOROS"
In the open space a solitary figure was dancing.
The enclosure was not the circular place where the Girl Scouts held
their councils, but deeper in the woods, although not a great distance
away.
The space was larger. Instead of being surrounded by giant beech trees,
a new grove of young beeches was here growing up to take the places of
older trees that had died or been cut down. Their slender trunks were
high and arched, their branches curved downward. They seemed to stoop,
as young things that have grown too tall for their own strength. The
green of their leaves was paler and more transparent. Underneath the
trees the ground was covered with a finer, softer grass.
The girl was dancing barefoot. She wore a thin white dress. On the
ground not far away was the khaki costume which she must have
discarded for the time being.
Her hair was short and fair, and she had a square, determined, lightly
freckled face. She was short and her figure not particularly graceful
in repose. Watching her dancing one thought of neither of these
things. The square head with the light fringe of curling hair was
perfectly poised, the body showed strength and lightness.
At this moment the girl was moving in a wide circle inside the fringe
of young beeches. Her arms were extended above her head; at regular
intervals she poised and stood upon her toes, then danced more
rapidly. At length, with a little fluttering movement like a swallow
about to alight, she dropped on the grass, her arms covering her head.
From a short distance away came exclamations of pleasure.
Stiffening with surprise, anger, and what might have been alarm, the
small figure arose.
Tory Drew, pushing a wheeled chair with a good deal of difficulty,
slowly advanced. Seated in the chair was Katherine Moore.
"Evan, I am sorry we have intruded upon you and stopped your dance. It
did not occur to me until this moment that you did not hear us
approaching. Kara was bored and I thought if I could manage we would
come down here to our 'Choros.' Isn't it learned to have called our
dancing ground by the name of the first dancing grounds ever
discovered and built by Daedalus, the famous artificer of Crete?
However, we are obliged to give Miss Frean the credit for most of our
erudition.
"We will go on again to the lake as soon as I have rested a little.
May I say that it was wonderful to see you? I did not dream that any
one of our Girl Scout Troop could dance as you do. I am sure Kara must
have enjoyed watching you. So you will forgive my not having told you
we were near."
The girl in the wheeled chair lifted her head.
"I wonder, Tory, why you think I enjoy seeing another person dance?
Isn't it hard enough to sit everlastingly watching you walking,
swimming, doing whatever you wish, while I am more helpless than a
baby? Naturally it affords me _especial_ joy to behold another girl
who can do all these other things and dance like a wood nymph
besides!"
In the young voice there was a note that made her companions stare
helplessly toward her and then drop their eyes as if they were
responsible and ashamed.
"Kara, dear, it is my fault. Things always seem to be my fault, I am
so stupid these days! I never realized that you would mind the
dancing. I had forgotten how much you used to care for dancing.
Besides, I did not suppose we would find any one here, and thought we
could enjoy the cool and the quiet.
"Good-by, Evan. You _are_ a wood nymph. Kara was right."
Tory had placed her hands on the back of the wheeled chair and was
about to move on, when again a querulous voice interrupted:
"Oh, no, let us not go at once. You are always tiring yourself to
death for me these days. Don't think I never overhear Miss Mason and
the other girls speaking of it, Tory. One learns to hear more than one
should in my position. I was not always an eavesdropper. Neither did I
suppose you would have to be a martyr for my sake, Tory. I wish you
would try not to be; a martyr is a noble character, but one does not
wish one for a constant companion."
Tory Drew made no reply. Instead she shoved the heavy chair into a
cool, green shelter and dropped down on the ground beside it.
The other girl followed, anxious to be useful and not knowing what she
should do.
A week had passed since Kara's return to her friends in their Girl
Scout camp in Beechwood Forest. The Kara who had gone away after her
accident and the Kara who had come back seemed two utterly different
human beings.
The courageous, gay, sweet-tempered girl was now rebellious, fretful,
impatient. Indeed, she had become more difficult than any one who had
known her previously could have imagined.
The little group of Girl Scouts were being tested, and more than any
one of them, Tory Drew. So far not once had she faltered. Knowing Tory
six months before, one could scarcely have believed this possible.
Always she had been sweet and charming, but self centered and spoiled.
Now, was it her affection for Katherine Moore or the months of her
Scout training that had given her a new spirit?
"Suppose you tell us how you learned to dance in that beautiful
fashion, Evan? Then, if Kara wishes, perhaps you will dance for us
again?"
The girl with the odd, boyish name gazed at Tory Drew reflectively.
Since their arrival in camp she had conceived a deep admiration for
Tory. She had never spoken of it to any human being. Tory possessed
this charm, of which she was unconscious, which was to gain her
friends all her life.
Evan sat down on the ground nearby.
She was a year younger than the other two girls. At this moment, in
her shabby, simple white dress, she appeared a good deal younger.
"Would you really like to know about my dancing? I have been wanting
to tell some one. It would be absurd to pretend I had not been taught,
no one with any judgment would believe me. Besides, when one is a Girl
Scout I do not think one desires to keep secrets from the other girls.
Perhaps you won't approve of me afterwards, but I shall run that
risk."
Tory laughed.
"You are a dear! I approve of nearly every one. What could there be to
object to in your wonderful dancing? Don't you know every girl who
sees you must envy you."
A little fearfully Tory glanced upward toward Kara.
Had she been tactless again? Everything she said or did appeared the
wrong thing these days.
At present apparently Kara was not looking or listening to either of
them. Her gray eyes, which showed so wistfully in her thin face, were
fixed on a far-off line of the sky between two clumps of trees.
"Well, you might as well hear the worst at the start," Evan went on,
smiling and revealing her small, even teeth.
"In the first place, I received my ridiculous name because my father
died a short time after I was born. It was intended I should be a boy,
so I was named for him. We were poor and mother had to make her own
living and mine. She did not feel troubled over this because she had
studied dancing and loved it. So she gave dancing lessons in
California, and before I was two years old I was a member of her
class. We never would have stopped save that mother was ill and we
were forced to come east to consult a doctor. We came to Westhaven to
live so she could be near New York and I at school. Mother is better,
and next winter intends to begin teaching again."
"So you wish to be a dancing teacher?" Katherine Moore asked. The
other girls were under the impression that she had not heard what they
were saying.
Evan jumped up quickly.
"Never, I should hate it! I mean to study folk dancing and some day
originate new dances that shall be as American as possible. We talk of
the folk dancing of the Irish and Spanish, and the Austrians and the
Dutch and any number of other nations. When we speak of American folk
dancing it is supposed we dance like the Indians. I don't see why we
can't create a national folk dance of our own."
Evan made a cup of her hands and dropped her chin into it.
"Please don't laugh; I think an American folk dance might be like
these young beech trees. I know that sounds absurd. What I mean is,
the dance should show youth and freshness and grace, beautiful things
like a primeval American forest. Oh, I don't suppose you understand
me. I am sure I don't quite understand myself!
"Since I have been at camp Miss Mason has allowed me to come here an
hour each morning to practice. May I show you the dance I have been
trying to compose. I don't mind if you laugh at the dance or at me, I
do it so badly. I shall learn some day. I like to call it 'The Dance
of the Young Beeches'."
Without waiting for Kara's or Tory's agreement, Evan was up and away.
Slowly she again circled around the beautiful dancing ground, her arms
and body waving with gentle, fanciful undulations.
Now and then she seemed to be swept by light winds; again a storm
pressed upon her and she bowed and swayed as if resisting with all her
strength. Afterwards, wishing to suggest that the storm had passed and
the sun was shining and the birds singing, she tiptoed about, her arms
gently undulating, her face looking upward.
The dancing was crude and yet would have been attractive to eyes more
accustomed to trained dancing than Tory's or Kara's.
Tory's first sensation was one of pure, artistic pleasure. Then
glancing at Kara she felt a deeper joy. A moment Kara appeared to have
forgotten her own misfortune. She looked more interested, more
entertained than in many days.
"Don't you think, Evan, that if your mother is well she might be
persuaded to come to your camp and teach us dancing?" Kara demanded,
as if she too could be included in the lessons. "I know when we first
decided to have our camp in Beechwood Forest one of the things we
talked of doing was learning outdoor dancing. We hoped Miss Mason
would be able to teach us. She only knows ordinary dances, and insists
she does not even know the newest of these. She has not gone into
society since the death of the young officer to whom she was engaged,"
Kara confided. "Sometimes I wonder if being Captain of our Girl Scout
Troop has not helped her almost as much as the rest of us?"
She stopped abruptly.
Farther off in the woods the three girls heard a strange sound.
It was as if some one were calling. Yet the noise was not the Girl
Scout signal.
Ten minutes later, on the way back to camp, unexpectedly the three
girls beheld Teresa Peterson hurrying on alone. She looked surprised,
even a little frightened, by their appearance.
When Tory inquired where she had been, as Teresa made no reply, the
question was dropped.
No one was supposed to leave the camp without special permission from
the Troop Captain. There was no reason, however, to suppose that
Teresa had not received this permission.