apparently undisturbed by the confusion consequent to the downfall of
a piece of furniture known to be somewhat erratic, "they'll laugh at
us or be bored. We shall be known as the freshmen who invited seniors
and Faculty and town-people to meet--nobody at all! A pretty
reputation!"
"But, Grace, we couldn't help it! Such things will happen!" Katherine
was pinning the Gibson Girl to the wall, in bold defiance of the
matron's known views on that subject.
"Yes, of course. But they mustn't happen to freshmen!" her room-mate
returned sententiously. "How many Faculty did you ask?"
"I asked Miss Parker, because she fitted Henrietta for college, at
Archer Hall, and I asked Miss Williams, because she knows Henrietta's
mother--Oh! Miss Williams will freeze me to death when she comes here
and sees just us!--and I asked Miss Dodge, because she knows a lot of
Bryn Mawr people. Then Mrs. Patton on Elm Street was a school friend
of Mrs. Biddle's, and--oh! Grace, I _can't_ manage them alone! Let's
tell them not to come!"
"And what shall we do with the sandwiches? And the little cakes? And
the lemons that I sliced? And the tea-cups and spoons I borrowed? And
that pint of extra thick cream?" Miss Farwell checked off these
interesting items on her fingers, and kicked the floor-cushions to
point the question.
"Oh! I don't know! Isn't there any chance--"
"No, goosey, there isn't. See here!" Grace pulled down a letter with a
special delivery stamp from the desk above her head, and read with
emphasis:
Dear Kitten,--Just a line to say that Aunt Mary has sent for
me at three days' notice to go to Paris with her for a year.
It's now or never, you know, and I've left the college, and
will come back to graduate with '9-. So sorry I can't see you
before I go. Had looked forward to a very interesting time,
renewing my own freshman days, and all that. Please send my
blue cloth suit right on to Philadelphia C. O. D. when it comes
to you. I hope you hadn't gotten anything up for me.
With much love,
HENRIETTA BIDDLE.
Bryn Mawr, March 5.
"I don't think there's much chance, my dear."
"No," said Katherine, sadly, and with a final pat administered to the
screen, which still wobbled unsteadily. "No, I suppose there isn't.
And it's eleven o'clock. They'll be here at four! Oh! and I asked that
pretty junior, Miss Pratt, you know. Henrietta knew her sister. She
was in '8-."
"Ah," returned Miss Farwell, with a suspicious sweetness, "why didn't
you ask a few more, Katherine, dear? What with the list we made out
together and these last extra ones--"
"But I thought there wasn't any use having the largest double room in
the house, if we couldn't have a decent-sized party in it! And think
of all those darling, thin little sandwiches!--Oh well, we might just
as well be sensible and carry the thing through, Gracie! But I am just
as afraid as I can be: I tell you that. And Miss Williams will freeze
me stiff." The yellow hair was snugly braided and wound around by now,
and a neat though worried maiden sat on the couch and punched the
Harvard pillow reflectively.
"Never mind her, Kitten, but just go ahead. You know Caroline Wilde
said it was all right to ask her if she was Miss Biddle's mother's
friend, and there wasn't time to take her all around, and you know how
nice Miss Parker was about it. We can't help it, as you say, and
we'll go and get the flowers as we meant to. Have you anything this
hour?"
With her room-mate to back her, to quote the young lady herself, Miss
Sewall felt equal to almost any social function. Terrifying as her
position appeared--and strangely enough, the seniors appalled her far
more than the Faculty--there was yet a certain excitement in the
situation. What should she say to them? Would they be kind about it,
or would they all turn around and go home? Would they think--
"Oh, nonsense!" interrupted Grace the practical, as these doubts were
thrust upon her. "If they're ladies, as I suppose they are, of course
they'll stay and make it just as pleasant for us as they can. They'll
see how it is. Think what we'd do, ourselves, you know!"
They went down the single long street, with the shops on either side,
a red-capped, golf-caped pair of friends, like nine hundred other
girls, yet different from them all. And they chattered of Livy and
little cakes and Trigonometry and pleated shirt-waists and basket-ball
and Fortnightly Themes like all the others, but in their little way
they were very social heroines, setting their teeth to carry by storm
a position that many an older woman would have found doubtful.
They stopped at a little bakery, well down the street, to order some
rolls for the girl across the hall from them, who had planned to
breakfast in luxury and alone on chocolate and grape-fruit the next
morning. "Miss Carter, 24 Washburn," said Grace, carelessly, when
Katherine whispered, "Look at her! Isn't that funny? Why, Grace, just
see her!"
"See who--whom, I mean? (only I hate to say 'whom.') Who is it,
Kitten?"
Katherine was staring at the clerk, a tall, handsome girl, with masses
of heavy black hair and an erect figure. As she went down to the back
of the shop again, Katherine's eyes followed her closely.
"It's that girl that used to be in the Candy Kitchen--don't you
remember? I told you then that she looked so much like my friend Miss
Biddle. And then the Candy Kitchen failed and I suppose she came here.
And she's just Henrietta's height, too. You know Henrietta stands very
straight and frowns a little, and so did this girl when you gave
Alice's number and she said, 'Thirty-four or twenty-four?' Isn't it
funny that we should see her now?--Oh, dear! If only she _were_
Henrietta!"
Grace stared at the case of domestic bread and breathed quickly. "Does
she really look like her, Kitten?" she said.
"Oh yes, indeed. It's quite striking. Henrietta's quite a type, you
know--nothing unusual, only very dark and tall and all that. Of course
there are differences, though."
"What differences?" said Grace, still looking intently at the domestic
bread.
"Oh, Henrietta's eyes are brown, and this girl's are black. And
Henrietta hasn't any dimple, and her hands are prettier. And
Henrietta's waist isn't so small, and she hasn't nearly so much hair,
I should say. But then, I haven't seen her for a year, and probably
there's a greater difference than I think."
"How long is it since those seniors and the Faculty saw Henrietta?"
said Grace, staring now at a row of layer chocolate-cakes.
Her room-mate started. "Why--why, Grace, what do you mean? It's two
years, Henrietta wrote, I think. And Miss Parker and Miss Williams
haven't seen her for much longer than that. But--but--you don't mean
anything, Grace?"
Grace faced her suddenly. "Yes," she said, "I do. You may think that
because I just go right along with this thing, I don't care at all.
But I do. I'm awfully scared. I hate to think of that Miss Ackley
lifting her eyebrows--the way she will! And Miss Hartwell said once
when somebody asked if she knew Judge Farwell's daughter, 'Oh, dear
me--I suppose so! And everybody else in her class--theoretically! But
practically I rarely observe them!' Ugh! She'll observe me to-day, I
hope!"
"Yes, dear, I suppose she will. And me too. But--"
"Oh, yes! But if nobody knows how Miss Biddle looks, and she was going
to stay at the hotel, anyway, and it would only be for two hours, and
everything would be so simple--"
Katherine's cheeks grew very red and her breath came fast. "But would
we dare? Would she be willing? Would it be--"
"Oh, my dear, it's only a courtesy! And everybody will think it's all
right, and the thing will go beautifully, and Miss Biddle, if she has
any sense of humor--"
"Yes, indeed! Henrietta would only be amused--oh, so amused! And it
would be such a heavenly relief after all the worry. We could send her
off on the next train--Henrietta, you know--and dress makes such a
difference in a girl!"
"And I think she would if we asked her just as a favor--it wouldn't
be a question of money! Oh, Katherine! I could cry for joy if she
would!"
"She'd like to, if she has any fun in her--it would be a game with
some point to it! And will you ask her, or shall I?"
They were half in joke and half in earnest: it was a real crisis to
them. They were only freshmen, and they had invited the seniors and
the Faculty. And two of the most prominent seniors! Whom they hadn't
known at all! They had a sense of humor, but they were proud, too, and
they had a woman's horror of an unsuccessful social function. They
felt that they were doomed to endless joking at the hands of the whole
college, and this apprehension, though probably exaggerated, nerved
them to their _coup d'état_.
Grace walked down the shop. "I will ask her," she said.
Katherine stood with her back turned and tried not to hear. Suppose
the girl should be insulted? Suppose she should be afraid? Now that
there was a faint hope of success, she realized how frightened and
discouraged she had been. For it would be a success, she saw that.
Nobody would have had Miss Biddle to talk with for more than a few
minutes anyhow, they had asked such a crowd. And yet she would have
been the centre of the whole affair.
"Katherine," said a voice behind her, "let me introduce Miss Brooks,
who has consented to help us!"
Katherine held out her hands to the girl. "Oh, thank you! _thank_
you!" she said.
The girl laughed. "I think it's queer," she said, "but if you are in
such a fix, I'd just as lief help you as not. Only I shall give you
away--I shan't know what to say."
Grace glanced at Katherine. Then she proved her right to all the
praise she afterward accepted from her grateful room-mate. "That will
be very easy," she said sweetly. "Miss Biddle, whom you will--will
represent, speaks very rarely: she's not at all talkative!"
Katherine gasped. "Oh, no!" she said eagerly, "she's very statuesque,
you know, and keeps very still and straight, and just looks in your
eyes and makes you think she's talking. She says 'Really?' and 'Fancy,
now!' and 'I expect you're very jolly here,' and then she smiles. You
could do that."
"Yes, I could do that," said the girl.
"Can you come to the hotel right after dinner?" said Grace,
competently, "and we'll cram you for an hour or so on Miss Biddle's
affairs."
The girl laughed. "Why, yes," she said, "I guess I can get off."
So they left her smiling at them from the domestic bread, and at two
o'clock they carried Miss Henrietta Biddle's dress-suit case to the
hotel and took Miss Brooks to her room. And they sat her on a sofa and
told her what they knew of her alma mater and her relatives and her
character generally. And she amazed them by a very comprehensive grasp
of the whole affair and an aptitude for mimicry that would have gotten
her a star part in the senior dramatics. With a few corrections she
spoke very good English, and "as she'd only have to answer questions,
anyhow, she needn't talk long at a time," they told each other.
She put up her heavy hair in a twisted crown on her head, and they put
the blue cloth gown on her, and covered the place in the front, where
it didn't fit, with a beautiful fichu that Henrietta had apparently
been led of Providence to tuck in the dress-suit case. And she rode up
in a carriage with them, very much excited, but with a beautiful color
and glowing eyes, and a smile that brought out the dimple that
Henrietta never had.
They showed her the room and the sandwiches and the tea, and they got
into their clothes, not speaking, except when a great box with three
bunches of English violets was left at their door with Grace's card.
Then Katherine said, "You dear thing!" And Miss Brooks smiled as they
pinned hers on and said softly, "Fancy, now!"
And then they weren't afraid for her any more.
When the pretty Miss Pratt came, a little after four, with Miss
Williams, she smiled with pleasure at the room, all flowers and tea
and well-dressed girls, with a tall, handsome brunette in a blue gown
with a beautiful lace bib smiling gently on a crowd of worshippers,
and saying little soft sentences that meant anything that was polite
and self-possessed.
Close by her was her friend Miss Sewall, of the freshman class, who
sweetly answered half the questions about Bryn Mawr that Miss Biddle
couldn't find time to answer, and steered people away who insisted on
talking with her too long. Miss Farwell, also of the freshman class,
assisted her room-mate in receiving, and passed many kinds of pleasant
food, laughing a great deal at what everybody said and chatting
amicably and unabashed with the two seniors of honor, who openly raved
over Miss Biddle of Bryn Mawr.
As soon as Katherine had said, "May I present Miss Hartwell--Miss
Ackley?" they took their stand by the stately stranger and talked to
her as much as was consistent with propriety.
"Isn't she perfectly charming!" they said to Miss Parker, and "Yes,
indeed," replied that lady, "I should have known Netta anywhere. She
is just what I had thought she would be!"
And Miss Williams, far from freezing the pretty hostess, patted her
shoulder kindly. "Henrietta is quite worth coming to see," she said
with her best and most exquisite manner. "I have heard of the Bryn
Mawr style, and now I am convinced. I wish all our girls had such
dignity--such a feeling for the right word!"
And they had the grace to blush. They knew who had taught Henrietta
Biddle Brooks that right word!
At six o'clock Miss Biddle had to take the Philadelphia express. She
had only stopped over for the tea. And so the girls of the house could
not admire her over the supper-table. But they probably appreciated
her more. For after all, as they decided in talking her over later, it
wasn't so much what she said, as the way she looked when she said it!
But only a dress-suit case marked H. L. B. took the Philadelphia
express that night, and a tall, red-cheeked girl in a mussy checked
suit left the hotel with a bunch of violets in her hand and a
reminiscent smile on her lips.
"We simply can't thank you; we haven't any words. You've helped us
give the nicest party two freshmen ever gave, if it is any pleasure to
you to know that," said Katherine. "And now you're only not to speak
of it."
"Oh, no! I shan't speak of it," said the girl. "You needn't be afraid.
Nobody that I'd tell would believe me, very much, anyhow. I'm glad I
could help you, and I had a lovely time--lovely!"
She smiled at them: the slow, sweet smile of Henrietta Biddle, late of
Bryn Mawr. "You College ladies are certainly queer--but you're smart!"
said Miss Brooks of the bakery.
THE FOURTH STORY
_BISCUITS EX MACHINA_
IV
BISCUITS EX MACHINA
B. S. Kitts--this was the signature she had affixed in a neat clerical
backhand to all her written papers since the beginning of freshman
year; and she had of course been called Biscuits as soon as she had
found her own particular little set of girls and settled down to that
peculiar form of intimacy which living in barracks, however
advantageously organized, necessitates. She had a sallow irregular
face, fine brown eyes surrounded with tiny wrinkles, a taste for
Thackeray, and a keen sense of humor. It was the last which was
subsequently responsible for this story about her.
She was quite unnoticed for two or three years, which is a very good
thing for a girl. During that time she quietly took soundings and laid
in material, presumably, for those satiric characterizations which
were the terror of her undergraduate enemies and the concealed
discomfort of those in high places. During her junior year she began
to be considered terribly clever, and though she was never what is
known as a Prominent Senior, she had her little triumphs here and
there, and in the matter of written papers she was a source of great
comfort to those whom custom compels to demand such tributes.
She was the kind of girl who, though well known in her own class, is
quite unobserved of the lower classes, and this, if it deprived her of
the admirations and attentions bestowed on the prominent, saved her
the many worries and wearinesses incident to trying to please
everybody at once--the business of the over-popular. She had a great
deal of time, which may seem absurd, but which is really quite
possible if one keeps positively off committees, is neither musical
nor athletic, and shuns courses involving laboratory work. It is of
great assistance also in this connection to elect English Literature
copiously, when one has read most of the works in question and can
send home for the reference books, thus saving an immense amount of
fruitless loitering about crowded libraries.
Biscuits employed the time thus gained in a fashion apparently
purposeless. She loafed about and observed, with _Vanity Fair_ under
one arm and an apple in the other hand. She was never the subject or
the object of a violent friendship; she was one of five or six clever
girls who hung together consistently after sophomore year, bickering
amicably and indulging in mutual contumely when together, defending
one another promptly when apart. The house president spoke of them
bitterly as blasé and critical; the lady-in-charge remarked
suspiciously the unusual chance which invariably seated them together
at the end of the table at the regular drawing for seats; the
collector for missions found them sceptical and inclined to ribaldry
if pushed too far; but the Phi Kappa banked heavily on their united
efforts, and more than usually idiotic class meetings meekly bowed to
what they themselves scornfully referred to afterward as "their
ordinary horse-sense."
One of the members of this little group was Martha Augusta Williams.
Sometimes she retired from it and devoted herself to solitude, barely
replying to questions and obscurely intimating that to _ennui_ such as
hers the prattle of the immature and inexperienced could hardly be
supposed even by themselves to be endurable; sometimes she returned to
it with the air of one willing to impart to such a body the mellow
cynicism of a tolerant if fatigued _femme du monde_. In the intervals
of her retirement she wrote furiously at long-due themes, which took
the form of Richard Harding Davis stories--she did them very well--or
modern and morbid verses of a nature to disturb the more conservative
of those who heard them. At any expression of disturbance Martha would
elaborately suppress a three-volume smile and murmur something about
"meat for babes;" a performance which delighted her friends--especially
Biscuits--beyond measure. Her shelves bristled with yellow French
novels, and on her bureau a great ivory skull with a Japanese paper
snake carelessly twined through it impressed stray freshmen
tremendously. She cut classes elaborately and let her work drop
ostentatiously in the middle of the term, appearing at mid-years with
ringed eyes and an air of toleration strained to the breaking point.
She slept till nine and wandered lazily to coffee and toast at
Boyden's an hour later, at least three times a week, with an air that
would have done credit to one of Ouida's noblemen.
And yet, in spite of all this, Martha was not happy. The disapproval
of the lady-in-charge, the suspicions of the freshmen, the periodical
discussions with members of the Faculty, who "regretted to be obliged
to mark," etc., "when they realized perfectly that she was capable,"
etc.,--all these alleviated her trouble a little, but the facts
remained that her own particular set would never treat her seriously,
and that her name was Martha Augusta Williams. Fancy feeling such
feelings, and thinking such thoughts, and bearing the name of Martha
Augusta Williams! It is, to say the least, dispiriting. And nobody had
ever called her anything else. Harriet Williams was called,
indifferently, Billie and Willie and Sillie. Martha Underhill took her
choice of Mattie, Nancy, and Sister. A girl whose name was Anna
Augusta. Something had been hailed as Gustavus Adolphus from her
freshman year on; but below _her_ most daring flights of fiction must
ever appear those three ordinary, not to say stodgy, names. That alone
would have soured a temper not too inclined to regard life with favor.
Martha might have lived down the name, but she was assured that never
while Bertha Kitts remained alive would she be able to appear really
wickedly interesting. For Biscuits would tell the Story. Tell it with
variations and lights and shades and explanations adapted to the
audience. And it never seemed to pall. Yet it was simple--horribly
simple.
Martha had invited a select body of sophomores to go with her to the
palm-reader's. There were two clever ones, who vastly admired her
Richard Harding Davis tales, two curious ones, who openly begged for
her opinions and thrilled at her epigrams on Love and Life and
Experience, and, in an evil hour, the Sutton twins, whom she admitted
into the occasion partly to impress them, and partly so that if
anything really fascinating should come to light, Kate Sutton could
impart it to her room-mate, Patsy Pattison.
When they were assembled in the palm-reader's parlor, Martha gravely
motioned the others to go before her, and they took their innocent
turns before the little velvet cushion. The Twins were admirably
struck off in a few phrases, to the delight of their friends, and the
palm-reader's reputation firmly established. In the case of one of the
curious girls, peculiar and private events were hinted at that greatly
impressed her, for "how _could_ she have known _that_, girls?" The
clever girls were comforted with fame and large "scribbler's crosses,"
also wealthy marriages and social careers, but they looked enviously
at Martha, nevertheless, and she smiled maternally on them, as was
right. There remained only the other quiet little girl, and she
modestly suggested waiting till another day, "so there'll be lots of
time for yours, Miss Williams;" but Martha smiled kindly and waved
her to the seat, suggesting that hers might not be a long session,
with an amused glance at the empty, little pink palm.
The palm-reader turned and twisted and patted and asked her age, and
finally announced that it was a remarkable hand. The dying interest
revived, and even Martha's eyebrows went up with amazement as the seer
spoke darkly of immense influence; tact to the _n_th degree; unusual
amount of experience, or at the least, "intuitional discoveries;" two
great artistic means of expression; previous affairs of the heart, and
an inborn capacity for ruling the destinies of others--marked
resemblance to the hands of Cleopatra and Sara Bernhardt. It was hands
like that that moved the world, she said. The sophomores regarded
their friend with interest and awe, noted that she blushed deeply at
portions of the revelation, recollected her Sunday afternoon
improvisations at the piano and her request for a more advanced course
in harmony, and attached a hitherto unfelt importance to her heavy
mails.
Martha may have regretted her politeness, but she smothered her
surprise, sank, with an abstracted air, upon the chair before the
cushion, and with a face from which all emotion had been withdrawn
and eyes which defied any wildest revelation to disturb their settled
_ennui_, awaited the event. The palm-reader glanced at the back of the
slim hand, noted the face, touched the finger tips.
"How old are you, please?" she asked. Martha wearily announced that
she was twenty-one. She was conscious of its being a terribly ordinary
age. The palm-reader nodded. "Ah!" she said easily. "Well, come to me
again in a year or two. I can't really tell much now."
Martha gasped at her. "You can't _tell_ much!"
The palm-reader took her hand again. "There's nothing much to tell!"
she explained. "The hand isn't really developed yet--it's the opposite
from the last young lady's, you might say."
She became conscious of a cold silence through the room, and added a
few details. "There's a good general ability; no particular line of
talent, I should say; orderly, regular habits; a very kind heart; I
can't see any events in particular; you've led a very quiet life, I
should say; fond of reading; I shouldn't say you'd met many people or
travelled much"--she scrutinized the hand more closely--"you'll
probably develop a strong religious feeling--"
She stopped and smiled deprecatingly. "It is really impossible to say
very much," she said, "just now. It's what we call an immature hand!"