LESSONS AGAIN
But all this fun and frolic soon came to an end, and Patty returned to
New York to take up her studies again.
Grandma Elliott was waiting for her in the pretty apartment home, and
welcomed her warmly.
Mrs. Elliott and Patty were to stay at The Wilberforce only about a
fortnight longer. Then Mr. and Mrs. Fairfield were to return and take
Patty away with them to the new home on Seventy-second Street. Then the
apartment in The Wilberforce was to be given up, and Grandma Elliott
would return to Vernondale, where her son's family eagerly awaited her.
"I've had a perfectly beautiful time, Grandma," said Patty, as she took
off her wraps, "but I haven't time to tell you about it now. Just think,
school begins again to-morrow, and I haven't even looked at my lessons. I
thought I would study some in Philadelphia, but goodness me, there wasn't
a minute's time to do anything but frivol. The wedding was just gorgeous!
Nan was a dream, and papa looked like an Adonis. I'll tell you more at
dinner time, but now I really must get to work."
It was already late in the afternoon, but Patty brought out her books,
and studied away zealously until dinner time. Then making a hasty
toilette, she went down to the dining-room with grandma, and during
dinner gave the old lady a more detailed account of her visit.
After dinner, Lorraine Hamilton and the Hart girls joined them in the
parlour. But after chatting for a few moments with them, Patty declared
she must go back to her studies.
"It's awfully hard," she said to Lorraine, as they walked to school next
morning, "to settle down to work after having such a gay vacation. I do
believe, Lorraine, that I never was intended for a student."
"You're doing too much," said Lorraine. "It's perfectly silly of you,
Patty, to try to cram two years' work into one, the way you're doing."
"No, it isn't," said Patty, "because then I won't have to go to school
next year, and that will be worth all this hard work now."
"I'm awfully sorry you're going away from The Wilberforce," said
Lorraine. "I shall miss you terribly."
"I know it, and I'll miss you, too; but Seventy-second Street isn't very
far away, and you must come to see me often."
The schoolgirls all welcomed Patty back, for she was a general favourite,
and foremost in all the recreations and pleasures, as well as the classes
of the Oliphant school.
"Oh, Patty," cried Elise Farrington, as she met her in the cloakroom,
"what do you think? We're going to get up a play for commencement. An
original play, and act it ourselves, and we want you to write it, and act
in it, and stage-manage it, and all. Will you, Patty?"
"Of course I will," said Patty. "That is, I'll help. I won't write it all
alone, nor act it all by myself, either. I don't suppose it's to be a
monologue, is it?"
"No," said Elise, laughing. "We're all to be in it, and of course we'll
all help write it, but you must be at the head of it, and see that it all
goes on properly."
"All right," said Patty, good-naturedly, "I'll do all I can, but you know
I'm pretty busy this year, Elise."
"I know it, Patty, and you needn't do much on this thing. Just
superintend, and help us out here and there."
Then the girls went into the class room and the day's work began.
Patty had grown very fond of Elise, and though some of the other girls
looked upon her as rather haughty, and what they called stuck-up, Patty
failed to discern any such traits in her friend; and though Elise was a
daughter of a millionaire, and lived a petted and luxurious life, yet, to
Patty's way of thinking, she was more sincere and simple in her
friendship than many of the other girls.
After school that day Elise begged Patty to go home with her and begin
the play.
"Can't do it," said Patty. "I must go home and study."
"Oh, just come for a little while; the other girls are coming, and if you
help us get the thing started, we can work at it ourselves, you know."
"Well, I'll go," said Patty, "but I can only stay a few minutes."
So they all went home with Elise, and settled themselves in her
attractive casino to compose their great work.
But as might be expected from a group of chattering schoolgirls, they did
not progress very rapidly.
"Tell us all about your fun in Philadelphia, Patty," said Adelaide Hart.
And as Patty enthusiastically recounted the gaieties of her visit, the
time slipped away until it was five o'clock, and not a word had been
written.
"Girls, I must go," cried Patty, looking at her watch. "I have an awful
lot of studying to do, and I really oughtn't to have come here at all."
"Oh, wait a little longer," pleaded Elise. "We must get the outline of
this thing."
"No, I can't," said Patty, "I really can't; but I'll come Saturday
morning, and will work on it then, if you like."
Patty hurried away, and when she reached home she found Kenneth Harper
waiting for her.
"I thought you'd never come," he said, as she arrived. "Your school keeps
very late, doesn't it?"
"Oh, I've been visiting since school," said Patty. "I oughtn't to have
gone, but I haven't seen the girls for so long, and they had a plan on
hand that they wanted to discuss with me."
"I have a plan on hand, too," said Kenneth. "I've been talking it over
with Mrs. Elliott, and she has been kind enough to agree to it. A crowd
of us are going to the matinée on Saturday, and we want you to go. Mrs.
Morse has kindly consented to act as chaperon, and there'll be about
twelve in the party. Will you go, Patty?"
"Will I go!" cried Patty. "Indeed I will, Ken. Nothing could keep me at
home. Won't it be lots of fun?"
"Yes, it will," said Kenneth, "and I'm so glad you will go. I was afraid
you'd say those old lessons of yours were in the way."
Patty's face fell.
"I oughtn't to go," she said, "for I've promised the girls to spend
Saturday morning with them, and now this plan of yours means that I shall
lose the whole day, and I have so much to do on Saturday; an extra theme
to write, and a lot of back work to make up. Oh, Ken, I oughtn't to go."
"Oh, come ahead. You can do those things Saturday evening."
Patty sighed. She knew she wouldn't feel much like work Saturday evening,
but she couldn't resist the temptation of the gay party Saturday
afternoon. So she agreed to go, and Kenneth went away much pleased.
"What do you think, grandma?" said she. "Do you think I ought to have
given up the matinée, and stayed at home to study?"
"No, indeed," said Grandma Elliott, who was an easy-going old lady.
"You'll enjoy the afternoon with your young friends, and, as Kenneth
says, you can study in the evening."
So when Saturday came Patty spent the morning with Elise. The other girls
were there, and they really got to work on their play, and planned the
scenes and the characters.
"It will be perfectly lovely!" exclaimed Adelaide Hart. "I'm so glad for
our class to do something worth while. It will be a great deal nicer than
the tableaux of last year."
"But it will be an awful lot of work," said Hilda Henderson. "All those
costumes, though they seem so simple, will be quite troublesome to get
up, and the scenery will be no joke."
"Perhaps Mr. Hepworth will help us with the scenery," said Patty. "He did
once when we had a kind of a little play in Vernondale, where I used to
live. He's an artist, you know, and he can sketch in scenes in a minute,
and make them look as if they had taken days to do. He's awfully clever
at it, and so kind that I think he'll consent to do it."
"That will be regularly splendid!" said Elise, "and you'd better ask him
at once, Patty, so as to give him as much time as possible."
"No, I won't ask him quite yet," said Patty, laughing. "I think I'll wait
until the play is written, first. I don't believe it's customary to
engage a scene painter before a play is scarcely begun."
"Well, then, let's get at it," said Hilda, who was practical.
So to work they went, and really wrote the actual lines of a good part of
the first act.
"Now, that's something like," said Patty, as, when the clock struck noon,
she looked with satisfaction on a dozen or more pages, neatly written in
Hilda's pretty penmanship. "If we keep on like that, we can get this
thing done in five or six Saturday mornings, and then I'll ask Mr.
Hepworth about the scenery. Then we can begin to rehearse, and we'll just
about be ready for commencement day."
While Patty was with the girls, her interest and enthusiasm were so great
that the play seemed the only thing to be thought of. But when she
reached home and saw the pile of untouched schoolbooks and remembered
that she would be away all the afternoon, she felt many misgivings.
However, she had promised to go, so off she went to the matinée, and had
a thoroughly pleasant and enjoyable time. Mrs. Morse invited her to go
home to dinner with Clementine, saying that she would send her home
safely afterward.
Clementine added her plea that this invitation might be accepted, but
Patty said no. Although she wanted very much to go with the Morses, yet
she knew that duty called her home. So she regretfully declined, giving
her reason, and went home, determined to work hard at her themes and her
lessons. But after her merry day with her young friends, she was not only
tired physically, but found great difficulty in concentrating her
thoughts on more prosaic subjects. But Patty had pretty strong
will-power, and she forced herself to go at her work in earnest. Grandma
Elliott watched her, as she pored over one book after another, or hastily
scribbled her themes. A little pucker formed itself between her brows,
and a crimson flush appeared on her cheeks.
At ten o'clock Mrs. Elliott asserted her authority.
"Patty," she said, "you must go to bed. You'll make yourself ill if you
work so hard."
Patty pushed back her books. "I believe I'll have to, grandma," she said.
"My head's all in a whirl, and the letters are dancing jigs before my
eyes."
Exhausted, Patty crept into bed, and though she slept late next morning,
Grandma Elliott imagined that her face still bore traces of worry and
hard work.
"Nonsense, grandma," said Patty, laughing. "I guess my robust
constitution can stand a little extra exertion once in a while. I'll try
to take it easier this week, and I believe I'll give up my gymnasium
work. That will give me more time, and won't interfere with getting my
diploma."
But though Patty gained a few extra half hours by omitting the gymnasium
class, she missed the daily exercise more than she would admit even to
herself.
"You're getting round-shouldered, Patty," said Lorraine, one day; "and I
believe it's because you work so hard over those old lessons."
"It isn't the work, Lorraine," said Patty, laughing. "It's the play. I
had to rewrite the whole of that garden scene last night, after I
finished my lessons."
"Why, what was the matter with it?"
"It was all wrong. We didn't think of it at the time, but in one place
Elise has to go off at one side of the stage, and, immediately after,
come on at the other side, in different dress. Now, of course, that won't
do; it has to be arranged so that she will have time to change her
costume. So I had to write in some lines for the others. And there were
several little things like that to be looked after, so I had to do over
pretty nearly the whole scene."
"It's a shame, Patty! We make you do all the hardest of the work."
"Not a bit of it. I love to do it; and when we all work together and
chatter so, of course we don't think it out carefully enough, and so
these mistakes creep in. Don't say anything about it, Lorraine. The girls
will never notice my little changes and corrections, and I don't want to
pose as a poor, pale martyr, growing round-shouldered in her efforts to
help her fellow-sisters!"
"You're a brick, Patty, but I will tell them, all the same. If we're all
going to write this play together, we're going to do it all, and not have
you doing our work for us."
Lorraine's loyalty to Patty was unbounded, and as she had, moreover, a
trace of stubbornness in her character, Patty knew that no amount of
argument would move her from her determination to straighten matters out.
So she gave up the discussion, only saying, "You won't do a bit of good,
Lorraine; and anyway, somebody ought to revise the thing, and if I don't
do it, who will?"
Patty said this without a trace of egotism, for she and Lorraine both
knew that none of the other girls had enough constructive talent or
dramatic capability to put the finishing touches on the lines of the
play. That was Patty's special forte, just as Clementine Morse was the
one best fitted to plan the scenic effects, and Elise Farrington to
design the costumes.
"That's so," said Lorraine, with a little sigh, "and I suppose, Patty,
you'll just go on in your mad career, and do exactly as you please."
"I suppose I shall," said Patty, laughing at Lorraine's hopeless
expression; "but I do want this play to be a success, and I mean to help
all I can, in any way I can."
"It's bound to be a success," said Lorraine with enthusiasm, "because the
girls are all so interested, and I think we're all working hard in our
different ways. Of course I don't have anything to do except to look
after the incidental music, but I do hope that will turn out all right."
"Of course it will, Lorraine," said Patty. "Your selections are perfect
so far; and you do look after more than that. Those two little songs you
wrote are gems, and they fit into the second act just exactly right. I
think you're a real poet, Lorraine, and after the play is over I wish
you'd get those little songs published. I'm sure they're worth it."
"I wish I could," said Lorraine, "and I do mean to try."