HELEN ADAMS'S MISSION
The particular mission that Madeline had discovered for the modern
college girl was one that Helen Chase Adams would never probably do much
to fulfil. But Helen had a mission of her own--the mission of being
queer. Sometimes she hated it, sometimes she laughed at it, always it
seemed to her a very humble one, but she honestly tried to live up to
its responsibilities and to make the most of the opportunities it
offered.
The loneliness of Helen's freshman year had made an indelible impression
on her. Even now that she was a prominent senior, an "Argus" editor, and
a valued member of Dramatic Club, she never seemed to herself to
"belong" to things as the other girls did. She was still an outsider. An
unexplainable something held her aloof from the easy familiarities of
the life around her, and made it inevitable that she should be, as she
had been from the first, an observer rather than an actor in the drama
of college life. And from her vantage point of observation she saw many
strange things, and made her own little queer deductions and comments
upon them.
On a certain gray and gloomy afternoon in November Helen sat alone in
the "Argus" sanctum. She loved that sanctum--the big oak table strewn
with books and magazines, the soft-toned oriental rugs, and the
shimmering green curtains between which one could catch enchanting
glimpses of Paradise River and the sunsets. She liked it as much as she
hated her own bare little room, where the few pretty things that she had
served only to call attention to the many that she hadn't. But to-day
she was not thinking about the room or the view. It was "make-up" day
for the sketch department--Helen's department of the "Argus." In half an
hour she must submit her copy to Miss Raymond for approval--not that the
exact hour of the day was specified, but if she waited until nearer
dinner-time or until evening Miss Raymond was very likely to be at home,
and Helen dreaded, while she enjoyed a personal interview with her
divinity. Curiously enough she was more than ever afraid of Miss
Raymond since she had been chosen editor of the "Argus." She was sure
that Miss Raymond was responsible for her appointment, but she had never
gotten up courage to thank her, and she was possessed by the fear that
she was disappointing Miss Raymond in the performance of her official
duties. So she preferred to find Miss Raymond's fascinating sitting-room
vacant when she brought her copy, to drop it swiftly on the table
nearest the door, and stopping only for one look at the enticing
prospect of new books heaped on old mahogany, to flee precipitately like
a thief in the night.
The copy for this month was all ready. There was Ruth Howard's
monologue, almost as funny to read as it had been in the telling, next,
by way of contrast, a sad little story of neglected childhood by a
junior who had never written anything good before, and a humorous essay
on kittens by another junior that nobody had suspected of being
literary. There was also a verse, or rather two verses; and it was these
that caused the usually prompt and decisive Helen to hesitate and even
to dawdle, wasting a precious afternoon in a futile attempt to square
her conscience and still do as she pleased about those verses. One of
them was Helen's own. It was good; Miss Raymond had said so with
emphasis, and Helen wanted it to go into the "Argus." She had rather
expected that Jane Drew would ask for it for the main department of the
magazine; but she hadn't, and her copy had gone to Miss Raymond the day
before. The other verses were also stamped with Miss Raymond's heartiest
approval, and like the rest of the articles that Helen had collected,
they were the work of a "nobody." Helen's vigorous unearthing of
undiscovered talent was a joke with the "Argus" staff, and her own great
pride. But to-day she was not in a benevolent mood. She had refused all
through the fall to have anything of her own in the "Argus"; she did not
believe in the editors printing their own work. But these verses were
different; she loved them, she wanted people to see them and to know
that they were hers.
She had thought of consulting Jane or Marion Lustig, who was
editor-in-chief, but she knew beforehand what either of them would say.
"Put in your own verse, silly child! Why didn't you say you'd like it
used in the other department? We've got to blow our own horns if we want
them blown. Use the others next time--or give them back."
But by next month there might be an embarrassment of good material, and
as for giving them back, Jane could do it easily enough, but Helen,
being queer, couldn't. For who knew how much getting into the "Argus"
might mean to that unknown other girl? Helen had never so much as heard
her name before, though she was a sophomore. She had a premonition that
she was queer too, and lonely and unhappy. The verses were very sad, and
somehow they sounded true.
"Perhaps she'll be an editor some day," Helen sighed. "Anyway I'll give
her a chance."
She put on her coat and gathered up her manuscripts, first folding her
own verses and pushing them vindictively into the depths of her own
particular drawer in the sanctum table.
When she reached the Davidson she noticed with relief that Miss
Raymond's windows were dark. She was in time then. But when she knocked
on the half-opened door she was taken aback to hear Miss Raymond's voice
saying, "Come in," out of the shadows.
"Oh, excuse me!" began Helen in a frightened voice. "I've brought you
the material for the sketch department. Please don't bother about a
light. I mustn't stay."
But Miss Raymond went on lighting the lamp on her big table. As she
stood for a moment full in the glare of it, Helen noticed that she
looked worn and tired.
"I'm very sorry that I disturbed you," she said sadly. "You were
resting."
Miss Raymond shook her head. "Not resting. Thinking. Do you like to
think, Miss Adams?"
"Why--yes, I suppose so," answered Helen doubtfully. "Isn't that what
college is supposed to teach us to do?"
"I shouldn't like to guarantee that it would in all cases," said Miss
Raymond smilingly. "Has it taught you that?"
"Yes," said Helen. "I don't mean to be conceited, Miss Raymond, but I
think it has."
"And you find it, as I do, rather a deadly delight," went on Miss
Raymond, more to herself than to Helen. "And sometimes you wish you had
never learned. When people tell you sad things, you wish you needn't go
over and over them, trying to better them, trying to reason out the whys
and wherefores of them, trying to live yourself into the places of the
people who have to endure them. And when they don't tell you, you have
to piece them out for yourself just the same." Miss Raymond came sharply
back to the present and held out her hand for Helen's bundle of
manuscript.
Helen gave it to her in puzzled silence, and watched her as she looked
rapidly through it.
"Ruth Howard?" she questioned, when she reached the signature of the
monologue. "Do I know her? Oh, a freshman, is she? She sounds very
promising. Ellen Lacey--yes, I remember that story. Cora Wentworth--oh,
I'm very glad you've got something of hers. She needs encouragement.
Anne Carter--oh, Miss Adams, how did you know?"
"How did I know?" repeated Helen in bewilderment.
Miss Raymond looked at her keenly. "So you didn't know," she said. "It
is a mere coincidence that you are going to print her verses."
"I don't know anything about her," Helen explained. "I heard you read
the verses in your theme class last week. And at the close of the hour I
asked you to let me have them and several other things. I used these
first because I had all the prose I needed for this time."
"I see," said Miss Raymond. "Have you told her yet that you want them?"
"No," said Helen, guiltily. "I was going to write her a note as soon as
I got home. I didn't suppose she would care."
"I presume you noticed that they are very remarkable."
Helen blushed, thinking how she had hesitated between these and her own
production, which she was sure could not be considered at all
"remarkable." "I--well, I went mostly by what you said. I don't believe
I am a good judge of poetry--of verses, I mean."
"You needn't be afraid to call these verses poetry. But I don't blame
you for not fully appreciating them. No girl ought to understand the
tragedy of utter defeat, which is their theme."
Miss Raymond paused, and Helen wondered if she ought to go or stay.
"Miss Adams," Miss Raymond went on again presently, "the author of those
verses was in my room just before you came. She wanted to return a book
that I lent her early in the term, by way of answering some question
that she had brought up in my sophomore English class. She says that the
book and the word of appreciation that went with it are the only
kindness for which she has to thank Harding college, and that I am the
only person to whom she cares to say good-bye. I don't know why she
should except me. I had quite forgotten her. I associated nothing
whatever with the name on those verses until I looked at it again just
now. I considered the tragic note in them merely as a literary triumph.
I never thought of the girl behind the tragedy." She waited a moment.
"She's going to leave college," she went on abruptly. "She says that a
year and a half of it is a fair trial. I couldn't deny that. She says
that she has made no friends, leaves without one regret or one happy
memory. Miss Adams, would you be willing, instead of writing her a note,
to tell her personally about this?"
"Why, certainly," said Helen, "if you think she'd like it better."
"Yes, I am sure she would. You won't find her at all hard to get on
with. She has a dreadful scar on one cheek, from a cut or a burn, that
gives her face a queer one-sided look. I suspect that may be at the
bottom of her unhappiness."
On the way across the campus Helen had an inspiration, which led her a
little out of her way, to the house where Jane Drew, the literary editor
of the "Argus" lived.
"I'm so relieved that my department is all made up," she told Jane
artfully, "that I feel like celebrating. Won't you meet me at Cuyler's
for supper?"
Jane promised, a good deal surprised, for Helen was not in the habit of
asking her to supper at Cuyler's; and Helen, after arranging to meet her
guest down-town, hurried on to the address that Miss Raymond had given
her, one of the most desirable of the off-campus houses.
Miss Carter was in, the maid said, and a moment later she appeared to
speak for herself. She flushed with embarrassment when she saw Helen,
and her dreadful, disfiguring scar showed all the more plainly on her
reddened cheek.
"Oh, I supposed it was the woman with my washing," she said. "I don't
have many calls. You must excuse this messy shirt waist. Please sit
down."
"Won't you take me up to your room?" asked Helen, trying to think how
Betty Wales would have put the other girl at her ease. "We can talk so
much better there."
Miss Carter hesitated. "Why, certainly, if you prefer. It's in great
confusion. I'm packing, or getting ready to pack, rather," and she led
the way up-stairs to a big room that, even in its half-dismantled
condition, looked singularly attractive and quite different somehow from
the regulation college room.
"I have a dreadful confession to make," said Helen gaily, when they were
seated.
"I've taken your verses for the 'Argus.' I've already sent them in to
Miss Raymond, and now I've come to ask if you are willing. I do hope you
are."
"Why certainly," said Miss Carter quietly. "You are perfectly welcome to
them of course. You needn't have taken the trouble to come away up here
to ask."
Then she relapsed into silence. Helen could not tell whether she was
pleased or not. She had an uncomfortable feeling that she was being
dismissed; but she did not go. Never in her life had she worked so hard
to make conversation as she did in the next ten minutes. The "Argus,"
the new chapel rules, Miss Raymond and her theme classes, the sophomore
elections,--none of them evoked a responsive chord in the strange girl
who sat impassive, with no thought apparently of her social duties and
responsibilities.
"She must think I don't know how to take a hint," reflected Helen, "but
I don't care. I'm going to keep on trying."
Presently she noticed that from Miss Carter's window could be seen Mrs.
Chapin's house and the windows of her and Betty's old room.
"That was where I lived when I first came to Harding," she began
awkwardly, pointing them out. Then she looked at the girl opposite, read
the misery in her big gray eyes, and opened her heart. Betty Wales, who
had worked so hard to get at a little of the story of Helen's freshman
year would have been amazed at the confidences she poured out so freely
to this stranger. Indeed Helen was surprised herself at the ease with
which she spoke and the dramatic quality that she managed to put into
her brief account of the awkward, misfit, unhappy freshman.
Miss Carter listened at first apathetically, then with growing interest.
"Thank you," she said gravely, when Helen had finished. "I thought I was
the only one who felt so."
"Oh, no, you aren't," said Helen brightly. "There are lots of others, I
guess."
"No one with a thing like this," said the girl, with a swift, passionate
gesture toward her scar.
"Don't," said Helen gently. "Please don't think about it. No one else
does, I'm sure."
"I got it just before I came here," went on the girl, speaking almost
fiercely. "It came in a horrible way, but it's horrible just of itself.
I entered Harding because I thought the college life--the girls and the
good times and the work--would help me to forget it--or to get used to
being so ugly."
Helen considered a moment in silence. "I guess we're even more alike
than I thought," she said at last. "We both expected college to do it
all for us, while we--just sat. But I can tell you--do you play
basket-ball? Anyhow you've seen it played. Well, you've got to keep your
eye on the ball, and then you've got to jump--hard. Have you noticed
that?"
Miss Carter laughed happily at Helen's whimsical comparison. "No," she
said, "I've never been much interested in basket-ball. I'm afraid I've
'just sat' or jumped the wrong way."
Helen considered again, her small face wrinkled with the intensity of
her thought. "You mean you've jumped away from the very things you were
trying to get hold of," she said. "You've expected things to come to
you. They won't. You've got to do your part. You've got to jump very
often, and as if you meant it."
The girl nodded. "I see."
"You can do one thing right away," said Helen briskly, rising and
buttoning her coat. "Do you know Jane Drew? Well, she's an awfully
clever senior and an editor. She's going to have dinner with me at
Cuyler's, and I'd like you to come too. You see one of the things you
have jumped into already is being a star contributor to the 'Argus,' and
we always want to meet our star contributors."
Miss Carter hesitated.
"Never mind your waist," Helen urged tactfully. "It looks perfectly
fresh to me, but you can keep your coat on if you'd rather."
"All right, I'll come," said Miss Carter bravely.
And having yielded, she kept to the spirit, as well as the letter, of
her promise. Jane, who was a very matter-of-fact young person, treated
her with the same off-hand cordiality that she would have bestowed on
any other chance acquaintance with interesting possibilities. The girls
who stopped at the table to speak to Jane or Helen, smiled and nodded
affably when they were introduced. Some of them stared a little, at the
unusual combination of two prominent seniors and an obscure
underclassman, but Miss Carter did not flinch. After dinner, when Jane
had gone to speak to some friends at another table, she leaned forward
toward her hostess. "I want to thank you," she said shyly, "for telling
me about yourself and for bringing me here. Do you know, I was going to
leave college, but I'm not now. I'm going to stay on--and try jumping,"
she ended quickly as Jane reappeared.
So Helen felt that her dinner had been a success, even though she should
have to borrow largely from her next month's meagre allowance to pay for
it.
On her way through the campus she met Miss Raymond, hurrying to meet an
important engagement. But she stopped to inquire about Miss Carter.
"I knew you'd manage it," she said, when she had heard Helen's brief
story of her adventures. "You're a person of resources. That's why we
wanted you on the 'Argus' board."
Helen fairly danced the rest of the way to the Belden. "Perhaps I shan't
be afraid of her next time," she thought. "I'd rather she'd say that
than have sixty verses in the 'Argus.' Oh, what a selfish pig I was
trying to be! I don't deserve to have it all come out so beautifully.
And--oh, dear, I'm late for the meeting of the house play committee, and
Betty said it was awfully important."
She found the committee in riotous and jubilant session in Madeline's
room.
"Three cheers for Sara Crewe!" shrieked Polly Eastman, when Helen
appeared.
"Goodness, I'm not Sara," gasped Helen.
"Oh, I mean the play, not the character," explained Polly impatiently.
"It's going to be simply great. What do you suppose we've got now,
Helen?"
"I don't know," said Helen, sitting down on the floor, since the bed and
all the chairs were fully occupied.
"Well guess," commanded Polly, tossing her a cushion.
"A lot of Turkish-looking things for Mr. Carrisford's study."
"Nonsense! We can get those all right when the time comes."
"Josephine Boyd has learned her part."
"Then she's done a tall lot of work on it since last rehearsal," said
Polly serenely. "I'm sure I hope she has, but this is something any
amount nicer."
"Then I give up."
"Well, it's a monkey," cried Polly triumphantly, "a real live monkey
that belongs to a hand-organ man in Boston. The Italian bootblack at the
station knows him, and--did he promise fair and square to get them up
here, Lucile?"
"Fair and square," repeated Lucile promptly. "I said we'd give him five
dollars and his fare up from Boston. It's well worth it. A cat would
have been too absurd when everybody knows the story."
"I hope Sara won't mind carrying a live monkey across the stage," said
Betty. "I should be dreadfully afraid it would bite."
"She ought to have thought of that when she took the part," said
Madeline. "She can't flunk now."
"Let's hurry it through and have the organ-man play for a dance
afterward," suggested the ingenious Georgia Ames. "He'd surely throw
that in for the five dollars."
"Better have him play between the acts too," put in somebody else.
"There's nothing like getting your money's worth."
"And we'll pay him all in pennies," added Polly gleefully. "We can take
turns handing them out to the monkey. How many pennies will there be in
five dollars and a fare from Boston, Lucile?"
Helen listened to their gay banter, wondering, as many thoughtful people
have wondered before her, at the light-hearted abandon of these other
girls. "It must be fun to be like that," she reflected, "but I don't
believe I should want to change places with any of them. They only see
their own little piece of things, and they don't even know it's
little,--like the man who didn't know anything about the forest he was
walking through, because he got so interested in the trees. My tree is
just a scraggly, crooked little sapling that won't ever amount to much,
but I can see the whole big forest, and hear it talk, and that makes
up. I'm glad I'm one of the kind that college teaches to think," ended
Helen happily.
A moment later she made an addendum. "Betty Wales is a kind by herself,"
she decided. "She doesn't exactly think, but she knows. And she's really
responsible for to-day. I wish I could tell her about it."