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[Illustration: DID I FRIGHTEN YOU? I AM SORRY.--_Page 35._]
MOLLY BROWN'S JUNIOR DAYS
by
NELL SPEED
Author of "Molly Brown's Freshman Days," "Molly
Brown's Sophomore Days," etc., etc.
With Four Half-Tone Illustrations by Charles L. Wrenn
New York
Hurst & Company
Publishers
Copyright, 1912,
by
Hurst & Company
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. DAUGHTERS OF WELLINGTON 5
II. MINERVA HIGGINS 18
III. IN THE CLOISTERS 32
IV. A LITERARY EVENING 44
V. VARIOUS HAPPENINGS 57
VI. "THE BEST LAID SCHEMES" 74
VII. A MIDNIGHT ADVENTURE 89
VIII. COVERING THEIR TRACKS 105
IX. THE GRAVE DIGGERS 116
X. A VISIT OF STATE 134
XI. A SWOPPING PARTY AND A MOCK TRIAL 147
XII. ALARMS AND DISCOVERIES 163
XIII. "THE MOVING FINGER WRITES" 175
XIV. AN INVITATION AND AN APOLOGY 187
XV. A CHRISTMAS GHOST STORY THAT WAS NEVER TOLD 200
XVI. MORE CHRISTMAS PRESENTS AND A COASTING PARTY OF TWO 212
XVII. THE WAYFARERS 226
XVIII. HEALING THE BLIND 246
XIX. A WARNING 259
XX. THE PARABLE OF THE SUN AND WIND 272
XXI. THE JUNIOR GAMBOL 289
ILLUSTRATIONS
Did I frighten you? I am sorry _Frontispiece_
PAGE
They set to work to dig a small grave for Judy's slipper 129
"And she's given me a pair of silk stockings," cried Molly 213
The next thing she knew she was buried deep in a snow drift,
and Judy was whizzing on alone 224
Molly Brown's Junior Days
CHAPTER I.
DAUGHTERS OF WELLINGTON.
No. 5 in the Quadrangle at Wellington College was in a condition of
upheaval. Surprising things were happening there. The simultaneous
arrival of six trunks, five express boxes and a piano had thrown the
three orderly and not over-large rooms into a state of the wildest
confusion.
In the midst of this mountain of luggage and scattered boxes stood a
small, lonely figure dressed in brown, gazing disconsolately about.
"I feel as if I had been cast up by an earthquake with a lot of other
miscellaneous things," she remarked hopelessly.
It was Nance Oldham, back at college by an early train, and devoutly
wishing she had waited for the four-ten when the others were expected.
"This is too much to face alone," she continued. "If it had been at
Queen's it never would have happened. Mrs. Markham wouldn't have allowed
six trunks and a piano and five boxes to be piled into one room. And
mine at the very bottom, too. If it wasn't a selfish act, I think I'd
leave everything and go call on Mrs. McLean--but, no, that wouldn't do
on the first day." Nance blushed. "But Andy's there to-day." She blushed
again at this bold, outspoken thought. "I shall get the janitor to come
up here and distribute these things," she added presently, with New
England determination not even to peep at a picture of pleasure behind
a granite wall of duty.
The doors of No. 5 opened on a broad, high-ceiled corridor, the side
walls of which were wainscoted halfway up with dark polished wood. On
either side of this corridor ranged the apartments and single rooms of
the Quadrangle, one row facing the campus, the other the courtyard. An
occasional upholstered bench or high-backed chair stood between the
frequent doors and gave a home-like touch to the long gallery. They had
been the gift of a rich ex-graduate.
Nance, closing the door of No. 5, paused and looked proudly down the
polished vista of the hallway, which curved at the far end and continued
its way on the other side of the Quadrangle.
The sound of voices and laughter floated to her through the half open
doors of the other rooms. With a smile of contentment, she sat down in
one of the high-backed chairs.
"Dear old Wellington," she said softly, "other girls love their homes,
but I love you." Thus she apostrophized the classic shades of the
university while her gaze lighted absently on a large laundry bag
stuffed full standing just outside one of the doors. It was different
from the usual Wellington laundry bag, being of a peculiar shape and of
material covered with Japanese fans.
"It's Otoyo's. Of course, she must have been here since Monday. I heard
she had spent the summer down in the village."
She hastened along the green path of carpet running down the middle of
the corridor and paused at the room of the Japanese laundry bag.
"Otoyo Sen," she called. "Why don't you come out and meet your friends?"
The Japanese girl was seated on the floor gazing at a photograph. She
rose quickly and flew to the door, thrusting the picture behind her.
"Oh, I am so deeply happee to see you again, Mees Oldham," she
exclaimed.
"She has learned the use of adverbs," thought Nance, kissing Otoyo's
round dark cheek.
"You see I have been studying long time. I now speak the language with
correctness. Do you not think so?" said Otoyo, apparently reading
Nance's thoughts.
"Perfectly," answered Nance. "But tell me the news. Is Queen's not to be
rebuilt?"
"No, no. Queen's is to remain flat on the ground. She will not be
erected into another building."
"And have you had a happy summer? Was it quite lonesome for you, poor
child?"
"No, no," protested Otoyo, still hiding the photograph behind her.
"Those who remained at Wellington were most kind to little Japanese
girl."
"And who remained, Otoyo?"
"Professor Green was here long time. I studied the English language
under him. He is a great man. It is an honorable pleasure to learn from
one so great."
"He is, indeed. And who else? Any of the rest of the faculty?"
"No, no. They had all departing gone."
Nance smiled. There was still a relic of last year's English.
"Mrs. McLean and her family remained at Wellington through the entire
summer," went on Otoyo fluently.
"And were they nice to you, Otoyo?"
"Veree, exceedinglee."
"Was Andy well?"
"Quite, quite," replied the Japanese girl, backing off from Nance and
slipping the photograph into a book.
Not for many a day did Nance find out that it was a portrait of that
youth himself, taken at the age of eight in Scotch kilties and a little
black velvet hat with two streamers down the back.
Suddenly Otoyo became very voluble. She changed the subject and talked
in rapid, smooth English. Could she not see the new rooms of her
friends? She understood everybody was coming down on the four-ten train.
It would be very crowded. She had found a new laundress whom she could
highly recommend.
Nance looked at her curiously as they strolled back to the other rooms.
Something was changed about the little Japanese girl. She seemed older
and much less timid.
It was Miss Sen who found the man to move the trunks, and who helped
Nance unpack her things and lay them in half the chest of drawers; and
it was Otoyo, also, who, with the skill of an artisan, removed all the
nails from the express box tops so that they might be unpacked
immediately by their owners. At lunch time she led Nance into the great
dining hall of the Quadrangle where more than a hundred girls ate their
meals three times a day. There was no attention she did not show to
Nance, and all because her conscience was heavy within her on account of
the one dishonorable act of her life. How could she know that among the
scores of photographs taken of young Andy from his babyhood to his
present age, Mrs. McLean would never miss one small, faded picture out
of the pile thrust into a cabinet drawer?
At last it came time to meet the four-ten, and Nance, looking spic and
span in fresh white duck and white shoes and stockings, was rather
surprised to find Otoyo also attired in a pretty white dress, her face
shaded with a Leghorn hat trimmed with pink roses.
"Why, Miss Sen," she exclaimed, "how did you learn so soon to dress
yourself in this charming American style?"
"At a garden party at Mrs. McLean's I learned a very many things," said
Otoyo, "and by the purchasing agent I have obtained dresses of summer,
of duckling, lining and musling; also this hat and two others very
pretty."
Nance laughed.
"You mean duck, linen and muslin, child," she said.
When the four-ten train to Wellington pulled into the station it seemed
as if every student in the university must be crowded inside. They
leaned from the windows and packed the doorways, overflowing onto the
platforms.
The air vibrated with high feminine shrieks of joy. Only the poor little
freshies were silent in all this jubilation of reunions. Suddenly Nance,
spying Molly Brown and Judy Kean, rushed to meet them, Otoyo following
at her heels like a toy spaniel after a larger dog. There was a long
triangular embrace.
"Well, here we are, _and juniors_," was Judy's first comment. "Nance,
you're looking fine as silk. No sign of travel on that snowy gown."
"There oughtn't to be," said Nance. "I just put it on half an hour ago."
"And look at our little Jap," cried Molly, hugging Otoyo. "Look at
little Miss Sen, all dressed up in a beautiful linen."
"Little Miss Sen has been learning a thing or two," said Nance. "She's
been to parties, she's been studying English under a famous professor;
she's been buying duckling, lining and musling dresses through a
purchasing agent with very good taste, and she's got a photograph she
looks at in private and hides away when any one comes into the room. Oh,
you needn't think I didn't see you!"
Otoyo blushed scarlet and hung her head.
"Oh, thou crafty one," Judy was saying, when four of the old Queen's
girls pounced on them with suit cases and satchels. "Why, here are the
Gemini," Judy continued, embracing the Williams sisters. "Burned to a
mahogany brown, too. Where did you get that tan? You look like a pair
of--hum--Filipinos."
"Don't be making invidious remarks, Judy," put in Katherine. "Learn to
see the beautiful in all things, even complexions."
In the meantime Margaret Wakefield, looking five years older than her
real age because of her matured figure and self-possessed air, was
shaking hands all around, making an appropriate remark with each
greeting, like the politician she was; and Jessie Lynch was crying in
heartbroken tones:
"I left a box of candy and a bunch of violets and two new magazines on
the train!"
"Where's my little freshman?" Molly demanded of the other girls above
the din and racket.
"There she is," Judy pointed out. "But there is no hurry. Every bus is
jammed full."
The lonely freshman was standing pressed against the wall of the waiting
room looking hopelessly on while the usual mob besieged Mr. Murphy,
baggage master.
"Why, the poor little thing," cried Molly, rushing to take the girl
under her wing.
"It's astonishing how one good deed starts another," thought Nance,
looking about her for other stranded freshies; and both the Williamses
were doing the same thing.
There were several such lonely souls wandering about like lost spirits.
They had been jostled and pushed this way and that in the crowd, and
one little girl was on the point of shedding tears.
"I can always tell a new girl by the wild light in her eye," observed
Edith Williams, making for an unhappy looking young person who had given
up in despair and was sitting on her suit case.
At last they were all bundled into one of the larger buses from the
livery stable. The older girls were thrilled with expectant joy while
they watched eagerly for the first glimpse of the twin gray towers; the
new girls, most of them, gazed sadly the other way, as if home lay
behind them.
"It isn't a case of 'abandon hope all ye who enter here,'" observed Judy
to a dejected freshman who in five minutes had lost all interest in her
college career. "Look at us blooming creatures and you'll see what it
can do. There's no end to the fun of it and no end to the things you'll
learn besides mere book knowledge."
"I suppose so," said the girl, struggling to keep back her tears, "but
it's a little lonesome at first."
"Poor little souls," thought Molly, who had overheard with much pride
Judy's eulogy of college, "how can we explain it to them? They'll just
have to find it out themselves as we did before them."
The truth is, our new juniors felt quite motherly and old.
A hushed silence fell over the Queen's girls when the bus drove by the
grass-grown plot where once had stood their college home.
"If a dear friend had been buried there, we couldn't have felt more
solemn," Molly wrote her sister that night.
But the prestige felt in alighting finally at the great arched entrance
to the Quadrangle drove away all sad thoughts, and when they hastened
down the long polished corridor to their rooms, they could not quench
the pride which rose in their breasts. It was the real thing at last.
Queen's and O'Reilly's had been great fun, but this was college. They
were the true daughters of Wellington now, and that night when the
gates clicked together at ten, they would sleep for the first time
behind her gray stone walls.
At that moment the voices of a hundred-odd other daughters hummed
through the halls, but it was all a part of the college atmosphere, as
Judy said.
Their bedrooms were not quite as large as the old Queen's rooms, but oh,
the sitting room! They viewed it with pride. Each of the three had
contributed something toward additional furniture. The piano was Judy's;
the divan, Nance's; and the cushions, yet to be unpacked, Molly's. There
was another contribution not made by any of the three. It was the
beautiful Botticelli photograph left for Molly by Mary Stewart, who
had gone to Europe for the winter.
"How glad I am the walls are pale yellow and the woodwork white!"
exclaimed Judy joyfully.
"How glad I am there's plenty of room on these shelves for everybody's
books," said Nance.
"And how glad I am to be a junior and back at old Wellington," finished
Molly, squeezing a hand of each friend.