PROFESSOR MINTURN'S EXPERIMENT
It needed no "cutting-up" of Sarah's room-mates to send her again to
Miss Ellingwood's room. She had just settled fearfully to study the
next evening, when there was a rap at the door, and Miss Ellingwood
appeared. She was amused at herself because her room had seemed
strangely lonely without the little figure bending over the table at
her side.
"Don't you want to bring your books over to my room?" she asked; and
Sarah responded with delighted alacrity.
When Ellen and Mabel came in and found that she had gone, they were
not at all pleased. They knew that Sarah had finished her Geography
lesson and they had hoped to have some help. When they discovered the
neatly drawn maps in Sarah's drawer in the table, they decided that
they would do as well.
"We'll get even with her for tattling," laughed Mabel, as she prepared
to copy them with tissue paper and black impression paper.
As the days passed, it seemed to Sarah that she was living in a new
world. When she was not in class or in the gymnasium, she was in Miss
Ellingwood's room, or walking with Miss Ellingwood. Miss Ellingwood
helped her over the hard places in her work, she laughed at her
mistakes in English, and corrected them, she let Sarah help to serve
the tea when the boys and girls came in in the afternoons.
The Juniors came oftenest; they were in Miss Ellingwood's class,
and as the time for the giving of the "Christmas Carol" approached,
they were there constantly. Sarah had read the story; she knew how
old Scrooge's sordid heart, devoted to money-getting, was filled with
the Christmas spirit by the appearance of his dead partner, Jacob
Marley, and by the three ghosts of Christmas Present, Christmas Past,
and Christmas Future. Ethel Davis and Gertrude Manley were to be Mrs.
Cratchit and Fred's wife,--they were the leading women's parts. To
Sarah's thinking, there were no rôles so interesting as those of the
ghosts, which were taken by boys. Their costumes were so wonderful,
they moved about so mysteriously, they were able to introduce so many
original devices. Perhaps next year, if she were promoted to the Junior
class, and if there were a ghost in the play, Miss Ellingwood might
give the part to her, and then she would be completely happy.
During the practicing, she took her books into Miss Ellingwood's
bedroom, and sitting there at her work, she could hear the Juniors
laughing merrily. When it was time for the tableaux, in which Scrooge
was to see his past and future, and all the harm he had done in the
present, they opened the door into the bedroom, so that they might have
a double stage.
It was then that Edward Ellis, Dr. Ellis's son, who was a Junior and
represented Jacob Marley, came and stood near Sarah's table and recited
his sepulchral part.
"'Expect the second spirit on the next night at the same hour!'" he
would say, while his chains clanked and rattled, and the blood of one
hearer, at least, congealed in her veins. "'The third upon the next
night when the last stroke of twelve has ceased to vibrate. Look to see
me no more; and look that, for your own sake, you remember what has
passed between us.'"
And then, "the apparition walked backward, and at every step it took,
the window raised itself a little, so that when the spectre reached it,
it was wide open."
Sarah had heard Miss Ellingwood read the directions, and Edward obeyed
them with many ghostly variations. Once Sarah had been called upon to
lift the window by jerks and starts.
In the midst of all the delightful excitement of school life, Sarah
often scolded herself for not feeling perfectly happy and contented.
She was learning more than she ever dreamed of learning, she had the
constant association of Miss Ellingwood, she practically lived in Miss
Ellingwood's luxurious rooms. But she had no life outside them, and it
was that which troubled her. She realized that there was a great deal
of fun in the school in which she had no share. There were parades
which appeared simultaneously with the stroke of ten, beginning at the
upper corner of the woman's side of the great building, and winding in
and out the halls, and down the stairways, like a long snake, to the
lower corner and back again. There were feasts by day and night; there
was dancing in the gymnasium after the classes were over. Sarah was
not invited to the feasts, and she looked on silently at the dancing.
It was true that she did not know how to dance, but if stout Mabel
Thorn could learn, she could also, she was sure. She tried the steps
sometimes when she was alone in Miss Ellingwood's room.
Mabel and Ellen ignored her completely. They did not always speak to
her when she came into the room. Once they allowed her to search for
her maps, which Ellen had been tracing, and which she had hastily
covered with her papers. Gradually, the whole school became aware that
her room-mates avoided her, and no one was clear-sighted enough to see
that it was a compliment to Sarah. When Ellen and Mabel were called to
the office and reproved for making unnecessary noise, they complained
loudly that Sarah had reported them, forgetting the many times that
Miss Jones had come upstairs in the middle of the night to remonstrate
with them. The other students, even Ethel Davis and Gertrude Manley,
who thought they were just, began to look a little askance at Sarah.
No fault is more hated by students than tale-bearing, and no suspicion
flies more quickly.
Ellen's and Mabel's rudeness did not trouble Sarah. That did not seem
worth worrying about. It was her failure to make friends with Ethel and
Gertrude, and the other Juniors whom she so admired, that troubled her.
Once she had called Ethel by her first name, and Ethel had responded
with a quick, "What did you say, Miss Wenner?" She had grown accustomed
to having her teachers call her Miss Wenner. But these boys and
girls,--that was different.
"At home," she said sorrowfully to herself, "I was always common"
(friendly); "and here I am just the same. But these people do not like
it, they are too high up."
It could not be because she was a newcomer, because they were gracious
to other newcomers. They called even the careless girl who spilled her
ink, Mary. They had teas in their room to which only newcomers were
invited, but Sarah was not among them. Sarah was convinced that it was
some grave fault in herself which made them avoid her.
Fortunately her work occupied most of her thoughts, and when that
was over there were always her letters home to be written. She gave
vivid, illustrated accounts of those same feasts and parades at which
she looked longingly, and the home people never guessed that it was
a lonely outsider who described them, sometimes in prose, sometimes
in much-admired jingle. She even described Ellen dressed to represent
William, as though it were all a great joke, which she had enjoyed
immensely. She told about Edward Ellis's wonderful "Bobs," a collie,
who could spring up to the low branches of the apple trees in the
fields at the back of the campus, and who could perform many wonderful
tricks. She drew pictures of him, and of Professor Minturn, who strode
about the room while he lectured, and of the Geography teacher, who
always folded his hands so precisely, and sat so still.
"Sarah's so dumb,
It makes him numb,"
she wrote brilliantly.
Laura and the twins wrote to her regularly, the twins with wild,
childish scrawls, which hinted surprises at Christmas, and Laura with
funny accounts of her own difficulties.
"You should have seen my waffles last evening," she would say. "They
were black on one side and a delicate buff on the other."
"Laura made waffles," the twins would write. "William ate seven and we
four."
Occasionally there would come a note in William's clear hand.
"Enclosed find a little spending-money. We hear that you are doing
well. Be a good girl."
It would have been a very ungrateful girl who could have been _very_
unhappy after that.
There were Christmas surprises in her cupboard, also. William's gifts
of money had been well spent. On the shelf above the secretary at
home, there had stood the battered school-books and a worn copy of
"Thaddeus of Warsaw." Poor Thaddeus was to be overshadowed henceforth
by several well-bound companions. There was "Westward Ho" for William,
and "Lorna Doone" for Laura, and "Alice in Wonderland" for the twins,
and a fairy-book for Albert. Rarely does the approach of Christmas find
a person so entirely satisfied with her gifts as Sarah was. But Miss
Ellingwood had selected them, and Miss Ellingwood was infallible.
There was another present which she was taking home. She had read
halfway through the upper shelf of Miss Ellingwood's story-books, and
she meant to remember them all, and then during the vacation, she would
sit down before the fire after she had washed the supper dishes, and
she would take Albert in her arms, and a twin would perch on each side
of her on the old settle, and they should hear some stories that were
stories.
She had become well acquainted with several of the professors who
came in to call on Miss Ellingwood in the evenings. One was Professor
Minturn, for whom she had read the paragraph of history on the first
day of school. He seemed to grow more nervous each day, and more
certain that his pupils might do more work if they would.
"That sub-Junior and Junior History might just as well be combined,"
he would say irritably to Miss Ellingwood. "Then they would finish
the American History in the sub-Junior year, and a thorough course of
General History could be divided between the Junior and the Middle
years. The present arrangement is senseless."
One day he asked Sarah to remain after class. The sub-Juniors looked at
one another and laughed. By this time, suspicion had spread through the
whole school.
"He probably wants to ask her whether you and Ellen study your
lessons," whispered Mabel's neighbor.
Sarah was startled by the first question which Professor Minturn
addressed to her.
"Are you well?"
"Yes, sir."
"Have you ever been sick?"
"I had the measles and the mumps." This sounded like the questions of
the gymnasium director. "And the whooping cough I had, too."
"Do you take regular exercise?"
"Yes, sir."
"You like to study, don't you?"
"Yes, sir."
"I thought so. How should you like to do a little extra work for me?"
All Sarah's life she had been doing extra physical work. She had taken
her mother's duties gradually upon her shoulders as she became ill; she
had then taken a large part of her father's work. But hitherto no one
had ever complimented her by asking her to do extra study. Her cheeks
glowed.
"I would like it very much."
"Very well," answered Professor Minturn, beaming with satisfaction. "I
wish you to prepare eight pages of history instead of four. Each day I
shall ask you some questions after class." Professor Minturn smiled.
He thought that he had discovered a way of trying a long-planned
experiment.
The Geography teacher had long since noticed that Sarah always knew her
lessons. One day he asked her in his precise way whether she had been
over the book before.
"No, sir. But I studied Geography with my father, and it is not so hard
for me like it is for some people. I know what is in this book."
The Geography teacher gave her a little examination.
"Why, I believe you are ready for State Board now. There isn't any
reason why you should waste your time with this class. How would you
like to come into the Physical Geography class with the Juniors?"
Sarah gasped. That would bring her into constant association with Ethel
and Gertrude, the objects of her devotion.
"I--I am afraid I am too--too dumb, _ach_, stupid, I mean."
The teacher laughed. All Sarah's teachers laughed at her more or
less. It was only yesterday that the gymnasium teacher had laughed at
her because she talked about "planting the smallpox" when she meant
vaccinating.
"You aren't too stupid at all," the teacher of Geography assured her.
"To-morrow I'll speak to Dr. Ellis about it. In the mean time, you
report with the Juniors."
Sarah's room-mates were not at all pleased by her promotion. Hereafter
there would be no maps lying in her desk ready to be copied, and their
marks would be materially lowered. They felt that her change of classes
was a personal grievance.
"No wonder that you get along," said Ellen rudely. "You are what we
call a teacher's pet. The other evening I went to Miss Ellingwood's
room to get permission to go downstairs, and the Latin teacher was
helping you. I don't think it is fair."
Sarah opened her mouth to speak, then closed it, flushing scarlet.
The Latin teacher did help her, but not with her regular lessons. His
helping her was a joke between him and Miss Ellingwood. They had a
great many jokes together, many of which Sarah did not understand. He
said that he should have to have some excuse for coming to see Miss
Ellingwood so often; he would pretend that Sarah was his pupil. And so
he used to give her simple sight translations to read. It was not part
of her daily lesson; with that of course he never helped her at all.
It was true that she studied her Latin grammar very hard, so that she
should be able to read at sight for Mr. Sattarlee without very much
stumbling, and she paid all the more attention to her daily lessons.
But he did not help her with them.
Ellen's remark seemed like an accusation of dishonesty. But she did
not explain, she could not. It seemed like disloyalty to talk about
the Latin teacher and his coming to Miss Ellingwood's room. He seemed
to belong to Miss Ellingwood, and if she were kind enough to allow
Sarah to be there when he came,--and he never came unless Sarah was
there,--it would be all the more contemptible to talk to Ellen Ritter
about it. Sarah hunted through her drawer for a fresh pencil and went
back to Miss Ellingwood's room. Her books had not been in her own room
for a month, nor had she slept there.
By this time Sarah had begun to think that the curriculum was very
carelessly planned. She was even with the Juniors in History and
Physical Geography and Latin, which were the three most difficult
subjects of the six which the Juniors had to pass.
She did not realize that she was growing a little tired. She could
scarcely keep her eyes open until bedtime; it seemed to her that the
Juniors, busily practicing for their play, or Mr. Sattarlee, calling
upon Miss Ellingwood, would never go. Gymnasium had become more of a
bore than ever. She disliked it before because it was monotonous; now
her step lagged in the marches and her arms fell heavily in the drills
because she was tired.
She went walking less often with Miss Ellingwood; Miss Ellingwood
went with Mr. Sattarlee. Miss Ellingwood had begun to be a little
absent-minded. Perhaps that was the reason that she did not notice that
Sarah's cheeks had lost their ruddy color, and that she no longer ran
briskly down the hall when she came from class.
Sometimes, when Miss Ellingwood was away, Sarah opened the door and
peered out into the hall. Down in Gertrude's room there was the sound
of merry laughter. She and Ethel were constantly inventing some new
entertainment. Once, when they had put up a sign at the corner of the
hall, notifying the public that they meant that evening to gratify a
plebeian fondness for Bermuda onions and bread and butter, Sarah almost
went to the feast. The notice begged all those who liked onions to
come, and warned all others to spend the evening with their friends in
distant parts of the building. Sarah would cheerfully have eaten crow
in such company. But she did not dare to go.