Concerning the Heroine of To-day
“Are you ready to go to the meeting of the club?” asked the blue-eyed
girl, as she bounced into the room. “Why, Dorothy, dear, what is the
matter? has your father gotten himself a new bicycle instead of one for
you, or—”
The blue-eyed girl sat up on the couch. “I don’t care if I never ride a
bicycle again as long as I live,” she replied, deliberately.
The girl with the dimple in her chin turned pale. “I knew it was
something awful when I saw you crying with the blinds all rolled up;
but I hardly thought it was so bad as that. You—you haven’t any fever
or queer feelings in your head, have you?”
“If I had, it would not make any difference,” she sobbed. “I—oh, I’ll
get even with Effie Bittersweet if it ruins my complexion and takes me
all the rest of my natural life to do it!”
“Oho, it’s Effie, is it? Well, you’ll have plenty of chances to get
even with her, once you are her sister-in-law!”
“I wouldn’t marry Jack now, to—to spite Effie, and I—I doubt if I shall
have the chance, anyhow. And as for Frances, I—”
“Never mind, dear; I know she has behaved abominably, but she is
punished already. Her aunt has brought her a new hat from Paris, and it
is geranium pink—fancy Frances in geranium, can you? She promised it to
Frances when she went abroad last fall, and Frances has been talking
about it ever since. She will have to wear it, too, because her aunt is
to make them a long visit, and she is too wealthy to have her feelings
hurt.”
The blue-eyed girl shook her head, sadly. “It is very kind of you to
try to cheer me,” she said, “but I am beyond rejoicing. I only hope it
is a very deep geranium pink, that’s all. Oh, Emily, what a desert
waste this life is! No, don’t put another cushion back of me—I want
to be just as uncomfortable as possible. You know Effie was here this
morning, don’t you?”
“I suppose so—I noticed that you have two portraits of Edwin on the
table.”
“Yes. Well, she asked me to go shopping with her, and I must say I was
pleased, because she hasn’t been here since—since—”
“Not since you quar—pardon me, I mean since her brother quarreled with
you.”
“She said she’d ask me to lunch with her down-town, but she had spent
almost all her allowance.”
“The idea of hinting to you in that bare-faced way! Now, if you had
been a man it—”
“Would have been all right, of course. However, I know how confidential
Effie always grows over a cup of tea, so I promptly invited her to
lunch with me. After she had accepted, I found that I had only fifty
cents to my name. Papa had gone down-town and, mamma had just borrowed
a quarter from me!”
“My goodness, did you tell Effie that your head ached so badly that you
couldn’t go?”
“And have her say that I was fretting myself ill over Jack? No, thank
you. I excused myself a moment and went downstairs, for I had just
remembered a habit Papa has of leaving money lying about on his desk.
To my joy, I found a five-dollar bill in one of the drawers, and I took
that, because I—”
“But weren’t you afraid to take it?”
“M—yes, but then one’s own people have to make up with one sometime or
other. Well, we had a lovely time shopping, and I took Effie off to
luncheon before she had had time to get cross matching samples. It was
a lovely luncheon, and before we had finished Effie said she hoped I
would visit her at Delavan in August!”
“H’m; I suppose she didn’t mention the fact that Jack expects to be in
Canada from the last week in July to the first one in September, did
she?”
“No; she didn’t. Oh, what a cat she is—and I asked her to take another
ice on the strength of it! Well I paid the bill, tipped the waiter,
and was just going out when the cashier came running after me, and oh,
Emily, what do you think?”
“You had left your umbrella, of course.”
“No, I hadn’t. I—I, that five-dollar bill was a counterfeit which papa
was keeping as an object lesson to mamma, who had gotten it in change!”
“You might have known that no man with a wife and grown daughter would
leave five good dollars in an unlocked drawer, dear. Did Effie—”
“Loan it to me? She hadn’t quite enough, and I don’t know what I should
have done if Frances had not happened to come in. Effie said that she
did not mind borrowing from Frances, because she—she was quite like a
sister to her! And now I shall have to make Papa angry by coaxing for
money to pay for all those ices Effie ate on false pretenses, and
w—worse yet, she and Frances will have the pleasure of laughing over it
together!”
“And telling Jack about it, too,” gasped the girl with the dimple in
her chin, helplessly.
“Of course I know they will do that,” sobbed the victim. “But I hardly
thought that even an intimate friend would be unpleasant enough to
remind me of it!” And she buried her face in the cushions and wept.
“Then you are not going to the club this afternoon? Shall I tell them
that you are busy with the dressmaker, or the dentist? They know that
you can make everybody else wait.”
“Tell them nothing. I shall go—and complain of a cold in the head,
which will explain the pinkness of my nose and eyes.”
“But will any of them believe you?”
“All of them. You know those horrid quinine tablets Evelyn is always
wanting people to try—well, I shall take one of them publicly. You
don’t suppose that any one will suspect me of doing it unnecessarily,
do you?”
The girl with the dimple in her chin shuddered. “Impossible,” she said.
The blue-eyed girl suddenly stopped curling her hair, and, facing her
friend, remarked: “I can tell you one thing though—Jack Bittersweet
shall pay dearly for this!”
* * * * *
The president of the Teacup club rapped for order with the handle
of her umbrella. “I am glad to see you all here to-day, in spite of
the weather,” she remarked. “We have a very interesting topic for
discussion. It is, ‘Woman in Her Character of Heroine.’”
“Indeed, it is interesting,” said the girl with the Roman nose. “I only
wish you had thought to mention it to me and I should have prepared
a paper on it. No, I couldn’t have done it, either, for my aunt from
New Jersey was in town, and I had to take her sight-seeing. Oh, dear,
aren’t people who live in the country painfully active? And what ideas
they have! They seem to think Lincoln Park is in the back yard and the
Statue of Columbus across the street.”
“I know a girl who has had a much worse time than that,” said the
brown-eyed blonde. “She had to take her future mother-in-law to see
the sights. The old lady had read up in preparation for her visit, and
knew more about the city than Marie herself. Now, while the poor girl
is being massaged with arnica and things to get over the effects of her
exertion, the old lady is busy telling her son that such an ignorant
girl can never make a good wife!”
“Speaking of the bravery of women,” said the girl with the classic
profile, “I know a girl who early one morning heard a noise in a large
closet next her room, in which she kept her furs and cloth gowns. She
slipped out of bed and into the hall, and turned the key, which was
fortunately on the outside, and there she had the burglar safe in that
stifling atmosphere. Then she fainted.”
“And no wonder,” said the girl with the eyeglasses. “I should have
fainted first.”
“It took them three-quarters of an hour to restore her and find out
what was the matter, then they sent for the police, and what do you
think they found?”
“That the burglar was dead,” breathed the girl with the Roman nose.
“No. It wasn’t a burglar at all; it was her own father, who had risen
early and gone into the closet to look for a file of papers which
had been kept in the attic for twenty years. Oh, he said perfectly
awful things when he got breath enough to speak! Unluckily, too, it
happened just at the time when she needed a lot of new things. She said
that nobody appreciated her bravery except a man who was paying her
attention at the time, and he didn’t dare say a word before her father
for fear of losing his good-will.”
“Humph!” said the girl with the dimple in her chin, “it only goes to
show that women are really more courageous than men.”
“Of course they are,” said the girl with the eyeglasses. “Why, only the
other day I read of a girl who had a hole bored in one of her front
teeth and a diamond inserted. Did you ever hear of a man who was brave
enough to go to the dentist unless he really had to?”
“No,” said the president. “Oh, girls, I once had my pocketbook snatched
from me by a boy, and I just ran after him until he dropped it. I don’t
know that I should have been so brave,” she added, “but for the fact
that, beside my card, it contained several unpaid bills of which my
husband knew nothing. If the police had caught the boy with it, they
would have communicated the fact to him, and I never should have heard
the last of those bills.
“I hope he appreciated your bravery, anyhow,” said the girl with the
eyeglasses.
“Of course not,” said the president; “his only comment was that it
served me right for carrying my pocketbook in my hand. Oh, you can’t
make a man understand that a woman fears nothing. By the way, I wish
several of you would come home to dinner with me. I broke Tom’s lovely
bit of old Venetian glass to-day, and I had rather not be alone with
him when he finds it out.”
“I’ll go with pleasure,” said the girl with the Roman nose, “is anybody
else coming?”
“Nobody but Mr. Troolygood,” said the president. “I always ask him in
such an emergency, because he prophesied that Tom would break my heart
within two years of our marriage. Tom knows that, and—well, I could
dance on the graves of his ancestors if Mr. Troolygood was present, and
Tom would encourage my efforts.”
“Then, I don’t see why you ask us to-day,” said the girl with the Roman
nose, “he ought to be—”
“Sufficient? Yes, I suppose so; but—well, the truth is that he is
rather hard to entertain, and Tom is so busy in his presence, being
nice to me, that he is no help at all.”
“I should be delighted to dine with you, also,” said the blue-eyed
girl, “but really I have such a cold that I don’t dare to be out at all
after nightfall.”
“Have you a cold?” said the brown-eyed blonde, “why, I didn’t notice it
when I met you in the restaurant this morning.”
“Didn’t you, dear? But then you are not very observant. You had not
even noticed that there was a wrinkle in the waist of your new gown,
until I pointed it out to you. Evelyn, dear, mightn’t I take another
of your quinine tablets now? I really think that I am feeling better
already.”
“Do not take too much of it, dear, if you value your peace of mind,”
said the girl with the eyeglasses. “I’ve had such an awful cold this
week. I don’t know how I ever caught it, unless it was sitting in that
hot church on Sunday. Mamma would have me go, and I—”
“Perhaps you caught it standing on your front steps Monday evening,”
suggested the girl with the classic profile. “I saw you, as I passed,
and wondered how long—”
“Oh, it was only a moment. The parlor was full of people, and I just
stepped out with Frank a moment to—to ask him how he expects to vote at
the coming election.”
“I thought you both looked as if you were discussing politics. Of
course, he had to think well on the merits of the opposing candidates
before he gave an opinion and—”
“Oh, pshaw, it is impossible to know how one catches cold, and it does
one no good to know, anyhow,” said the girl with the Roman nose.
“Unless it is some one else’s fault,” said the girl with the dimple in
her chin. “I have a cold myself, and I don’t dare to mention the fact
to my family. They are so unsympathetic that they—”
“Would want you to wrap up and wear overshoes if it was July,” said the
president.
“They would, they would,” wailed the girl with the eyeglasses, “well, I
just knew that I had to be well in time to go to Mrs. Brownsmith’s card
party. The way that Marie tries to attract Frank’s attention is too
dreadful, and I knew she would be there.”
“If she had to unscrew her coffin lid to get out,” said the blue-eyed
girl.
“M’hm. They wanted me to take all sorts of horrid remedies at home.
I wouldn’t do it, though; the very idea made me cross. Finally, on
Wednesday, Frank dropped in to see if I was better and said I must
take some quinine. Of course, I couldn’t refuse and hurt his feelings,
especially as he remained all the afternoon and watched me take it. By
his advice, I took a large dose of it that night, and when I woke up in
the morning my cold was almost gone, but oh, I had the queerest buzzing
in my ears!”
“Oh, well, nobody could see that,” said the president, “so you—”
“Kept on taking it all day, and was able to go to the card party, after
all; though the quinine had made me as deaf as a statue. It made little
difference at first, because Marie kept close at my elbow, and Frank
and I were not alone a moment. I couldn’t get rid of her at all until,
just as mamma said she would not wait another second Mrs. Brownsmith
called Marie to her, and Frank—”
“Improved the moment,” said the girl with the dimple in her chin. “What
did he say?”
“I—I don’t know,” sobbed the girl with the eyeglasses. “He whispered,
and I couldn’t hear. And before I could ask him to repeat, Marie was
at my side. As he put me into the carriage, he said: ‘You will let me
have my answer by messenger to-morrow, won’t you?’ And I—I don’t know
w-whether he ask-asked me to marry him, or only to go to the m-matinee!”
“You poor, dear martyr,” cried the president. “Dorothy, dear, you had
better not take any more of those tablets, because—”
“But dear, Dorothy is in no danger of having to answer such an
important question,” said the brown-eyed blonde, sweetly.
“Very true, dear; I have answered it already—in the negative,” said the
blue-eyed girl. “Ah, you can never know, Frances, how painful it is to
be obliged to tell a man who loves you that there is no hope.”
“Dear, dear,” said the president, hurriedly, “I’m afraid that, in spite
of all my efforts, we have not discussed to-day’s topic as consistently
as usual. It does seem to me sometimes that you girls talk as much as
men. Of course you do not expect to be listened to as they do, still—”
“I should think not,” said the girl with the Roman nose; “did I ever
tell you of the time I went to make a round of calls with Ethel, and—”
“Found she was leaving her sister’s cards by mistake?” said the girl
with the classic profile. “Indeed you did. And wasn’t it funny that she
left one for Maria, to whom her sister hadn’t spoken for a year? Just
like Ethel, too.”
“This was another time,” said the girl with the Roman nose. “You know
how much Ethel talks? Well, we called on one woman I had never met
before, and she asked Ethel subsequently if I was not deaf and dumb!”
“Never mind, she knew better when she met you next time,” said the girl
with the eyeglasses; “but what is the topic for discussion to-day?”
“‘The Heroine of To-day,’” said the president, “and I think—”
“I suppose that is the bachelor girl,” said the brown-eyed blonde.
“Or the one who marries a foreigner,” said the girl with the dimple in
her chin. “Talk about bravery! Why, I knew a girl who became engaged to
a Russian before she could pronounce his name.”
“Speaking of that,” said the girl with the classic profile, “isn’t it
horrid of Elizabeth to send out her wedding cards so long ahead. No
chance this time to say that we didn’t know it in time to select a
present.”
“I shall pretend that I never received my invitation at all,” said the
president; “one must protect one’s self somehow.”
“I do hate to go shopping with her nowadays,” said the girl with
the dimple in her chin, “if I don’t buy a lot of things myself I am
miserable, and if I do her reproachful gaze seems to say, ‘I know the
cost of this will come out of my present.’”
“As if you wouldn’t ask your father for the money for that, anyhow!”
said the girl with the classic profile.
“I shall do nothing of the kind, dear; it would make too much trouble.
I don’t know why a man will cheerfully give a wedding present himself,
but let—”
“One of the women of the family ask for money for the same purpose and
he feels that he is being robbed,” said the girl with the Roman nose.
“I suppose it is on the same principle that makes a man insist upon
treating every other man he meets and then grumble because his wife
wants oysters after the play,” said the brown-eyed blonde.
“Just as he feeds a girl on candy before he marries her and then
complains of dentists’ bills afterward,” said the girl with the dimple
in her chin; “men are so illogical!”
“Indeed they are,” said the girl with the Roman nose; “one of them will
keep on telling a girl that she has a swan-like carriage, and then
think her vain if he catches her watching her own movements in the
glass.”
“Why does she let him catch her at it?” queried the girl with the
dimple in her chin. “Oh, girls, you know that awful, dark green necktie
that Dick has been wearing! Well, I endured it until I felt as if I
should scream if I saw him wear it again, so I begged it from him; told
him that I wanted it as a souvenir to hang beside his college cap and
his football colors. As soon as he sent it to me I threw it into the
fire.”
“And he came in before it was reduced to ashes?” asked the president,
in sympathetic tones.
“No. He appeared with another just like it, the very next day—said he
didn’t like it himself, but since I had admired it and he wanted to
please me, he had matched it before he sent it to me!”
“And that was your only reward for trying to save his feelings,” sighed
the blue-eyed girl. “Really, Emily, I often think you are too good for
this world.”
“At any rate, I shall soon be out of it if so many sorrows are heaped
upon my head. By the way, girls, I’ve been learning to ride my bicycle,
and talking of heroism, I—”
“How many times have you fallen?” exclaimed the girl with the classic
profile. “I heard the other day of a girl who learned to ride in a
single lesson, without falling once, and—”
“Humph. I’ve often heard of that girl myself—but I’ve never seen her.
I’ve fallen nineteen times; that is, not counting the time mamma called
after me to be careful, and the time that Dick said I had ridden almost
a half block since he let go of my belt—because you know, it was not my
fault that I fell upon either of those occasions!”
“Of course not,” said the president, “but, girls, we really must not
talk about bicycling, because if we do we shall drift away from our
discussion, and I can’t bear to depart, even momentarily, from the high
standard of the club. We were speaking of Elizabeth a moment ago; has
any one seen her lately?”
“Not I,” said the blue-eyed girl. “I make a point of avoiding the girl
who is about to be married, the mother of the cleverest baby in the
world, and the woman who is designing her own house. Really, you know,
I don’t mind letting someone else do all the talking, but I _do_ like a
change of topic once in a while.”
“I know I was just as sensible as any one could be while Tom and I were
engaged,” said the president, “and yet, people did act so oddly. Why,
they would go right away if I began to talk of him at all; they didn’t
even stay long enough to see how sensible I was.”
“By the way, I believe that Jane and Mr. Sooter are engaged,” said the
girl with the classic profile; “Jane denies it but—”
“Then I think you are mistaken,” said the girl with the eyeglasses. “I
know Jane, and she seldom understates a case. Why do you think they are
engaged?”
“He has given up sending her flowers and candy, and begun presenting
bric-a-brac instead.”
“Pshaw, that is nothing; he may once have been engaged to a girl who
was a china maniac, and these may be the presents she returned.”
“Possibly. By the way, Kate has grown so wary now that she only gives
the man to whom she happens to be engaged presents which she can use
after she breaks with him; never pipes and—”
“Oh, by the way, I know how her last engagement came to be broken in
so many pieces that it could never be mended,” said the girl with the
dimple in her chin.
“Do tell us all about it; we are all so intimate with Kate that we
wouldn’t dare to tell anybody, because it would seem that we were
betraying a confidence,” said the girl with the classic profile.
“Well, when she was engaged to Mr. Yaleblue, she gave him a lovely
meerchaum pipe, which of course came back with her other presents when
the engagement was broken. By the next Christmas she was engaged to
Dan, and it seemed such a waste to let it lie in the case, and she gave
it to him, telling him a pretty little story of how she bought it
when she was in Paris, and kept it hanging in her den ready for Prince
Charming when he appeared. You wouldn’t think a little thing like that
would have broken the engagement, would you?”
“Why, of course not,” said the girl with the eyeglasses, “how on earth
did—”
“Oh, he just asked how it came that it was so strong of tobacco!”
“Dear me, girls,” said the president, “I am afraid that we really must
adjourn, though there is still a great deal more to say on both sides
of the discussion. But I have just remembered that I have invited a
whole party of you to dinner, and neglected to mention the fact to the
cook!”