A BUSY DAY.
The next day was always a chaotic one in Molly's memory--a jumble of new
faces and strange events. At breakfast she made the acquaintance of the
freshmen who were staying at Queen's Cottage--four in all. One of these
was Julia Kean, "a nice girl in neutral tints," as Molly wrote home to
her sister, "with gray eyes and brown hair and a sense of humor." She
came to be known as "Judy," and formed an intimate friendship with Molly
and Nance, which lasted throughout the four years of their college
course.
"How do you feel after your night's rest?" she called across the table
to Molly in the most friendly manner, just as if they had known each
other always. "You look like the 'Lady of the Sea' in that blue linen
that just matches your eyes." She began looking Molly over with a kind
of critical admiration, narrowing her eyes as an artist does when
he's at work on a picture. "I'd like to make a poster of you in
blue-and-white chalk. I'd put you on a yellow, sandy beach, against a
bright blue sky, in a high wind, with your dress and hair blowing----"
And with eyes still narrowed, she traced an imaginary picture with one
hand and shaped her ideas with the other.
Molly laughed.
"You must be an artist," she said, "with such notions about posing."
"A would-be one, that's all. 'Not yet, but soon,' is my motto."
"That's a bad motto," here put in Nance Oldham. "It's like the Spanish
saying of '_Hasta manana_.' You are very apt to put off doing things
until next day."
Julia Kean looked at her reproachfully.
"You've read my character in two words," she said.
"Why don't you introduce me to your friends, Judy?" asked a handsome
girl next to her, who had quantities of light-brown hair piled on top
of her head.
"I haven't been introduced myself," replied Judy; "but I never could see
why people should stop for introductions at teas and times like this.
We all know we're all right, or else we wouldn't be here."
"Of course," said Frances Andrews, who had just come in, "why all this
formality, when we are to be a family party for the next eight months?
Why not become friends at once, without any preliminaries?"
Sally Marks, who had given them the vague yet meaningful warning the
night before, appeared to be absorbed in her coffee cup, and the other
two sophomores at the table were engaged in a whispered conversation.
"Nevertheless, I will perform the introductions," announced Judy Kean.
"This is Miss Margaret Wakefield, of Washington, D. C.; Miss Edith
Coles, of Rhode Island; Miss Jessie Lynch, of Wisconsin, and Miss Mabel
Hinton, of Illinois. As for me, my name is Julia Kean, and I come
from--nowhere in particular."
"You must have had a birthplace," insisted that accurate young person,
Nance Oldham.
"If you could call a ship a birthplace, I did," replied Judy. "I was
born in mid-ocean on a stormy night. Hence my stormy, restless nature."
"But how did it happen?" asked Molly.
"Oh, it was all simple enough. Papa and mamma were on their way back
from Japan, and I arrived a bit prematurely on board ship. I began life
traveling, and I've been traveling ever since."
"You'll have to stay put here; awhile, at least," said Sally Marks.
"I hope so. I need to gather a little moss before I become an habitual
tramp."
"Hadn't we better be chasing along?" said Frances Andrews. "It's almost
time for chapel."
No one answered and Molly began to wonder how long this strange girl
would endure the part of a monologist at college. For that was what her
attempts at conversation seemed to amount to. She admired Frances's
pluck, at any rate. Whatever she had done to offend, it was courageous
of her to come back and face the music.
Chapel was an impressive sight to the new girls. The entire body of
students was there, and the faculty, including Professor Edwin Green,
who gave each girl the impression he was looking at her when he was
really only gazing into the imaginary bull's-eye of an imaginary camera,
and saw not one of them. Molly decided his comeliness was more charm
than looks. "The unknown charm," she wrote her sister. "His ears are a
little pointed at the top, and he has brown eyes like a collie dog. But
it was nice of him to have given me his soup," she added irrelevantly,
"and I shall always appreciate it."
After chapel, when Molly was following in the trail of her new friends,
feeling a bit strange and unaccustomed, some one plucked her by the
sleeve. It was Mary Stewart, the nice senior with the plain, but fine
face.
"I'll expect you this evening after supper," she said. "I'm having a
little party. There will be music, too. I thought perhaps you might like
to bring a friend along. It's rather lonesome, breaking into a new crowd
by one's self."
It never occurred to Molly that she was being paid undue honors. For a
freshman, who had arrived only the afternoon before, without a friend in
college, to be asked to a small intimate party by the most prominent
girl in the senior class, was really quite remarkable, so Nance Oldham
thought; and she was pleased to be the one Molly chose to take along.
The two girls had had a busy, exciting day. They had not been placed
in the same divisions, B and O being so widely separated in the
alphabet, and were now meeting again for the first time since lunch.
Molly had stretched her length on her couch and kicked off her pumps,
described later by Judy Kean as being a yard long and an inch broad.
[Illustration: "I wish you would tell me your receipt for making
friends, Molly," exclaimed Nance.--_Page 51._]
"I wish you would tell me your receipt for making friends, Molly,"
exclaimed Nance. "You are really a perfect wonder. Don't you find it
troublesome to be so nice to so many people?"
"I'd find it lots harder not to be nice," answered Molly. "Besides, it's
a rule that works both ways. The nicer you are to people, the nicer they
are to you."
"But don't you think lots of people aren't worth the effort and if you
treat them like sisters, they are apt to take advantage of it and bore
you afterwards?"
Molly smiled.
"I've never been troubled that way," she said.
"Now, don't tell me," cried Nance, warming to the argument, "that that
universally cordial manner of yours doesn't bring a lot of rag-tags
around to monopolize you. If it hasn't before, it will now. You'll see."
"You make me feel like the leader of Coxey's Army," laughed Molly;
"because, you see, I'm a kind of a rag-tag myself."
Her eyes filled with tears. She was thinking of her meagre wardrobe.
Nance was silent. She was slow of speech, but when she once began, she
always said more than she intended simply to prove her point; and now
she was afraid she had hurt Molly's feelings. She was provoked with
herself for her carelessness, and when she was on bad terms with herself
she appeared to be on bad terms with everybody else. Of course, in her
heart of hearts, she had been thinking of Frances Andrews, whom she felt
certain Molly would never snub sufficiently to keep her at a distance.
The two girls went about their dressing without saying another word.
Nance was coiling her smooth brown braids around her head, while Molly
was looking sorrowfully at her only two available dresses for that
evening's party. One was a blue muslin of a heavenly color but
considerably darned, and the other was a marquisette, also the worse
for wear. Suddenly Nance gave a reckless toss of her hair brush in one
direction and her comb in another, and rushed over to Molly, who was
gazing absently into the closet.
"Oh, Molly," she cried impetuously, seizing her friend's hand, "I'm a
brute. Will you forgive me? I'm afraid I hurt your feelings. It's just
my unfortunate way of getting excited and saying too much. I never met
any one I admired as much as you in such a short time. I wish I did know
how to be charming to everybody, like you. It's been ground into me
since I was a child not to make friends with people unless it was to my
advantage, and I found out they were entirely worthy. And it's a slow
process, I can tell you. You are the very first chance acquaintance I
ever made in my life, and I like you better than any girl I ever met.
So there, will you say you have forgiven me?"
"Of course, I will," exclaimed Molly, flushing with pleasure. "There is
nothing to forgive. I know I'm too indiscriminate about making friends.
Mother often complained because I would bring such queer children out to
dinner when I was a child. Indeed, I wasn't hurt a bit. It was the word
'rag-tag,' that seemed to be such an excellent description of the
clothes I must wear this winter, unless some should drop down from
heaven, like manna in the desert for the Children of Israel."
Without a word, Nance pulled a box out from under her couch and lifted
the lid. It disclosed a little hand sewing machine.
"Can you sew?" she asked.
"After a fashion."
"Well, I can. It's pastime with me. I'd rather make clothes than do lots
of other things. Now, suppose we set to work and make some dresses. How
would you like a blue serge, with turn-over collar and cuffs, like that
one Miss Marks is wearing, that fastens down the side with black satin
buttons?"
"Oh, Nance, I couldn't let you do all that for me," protested Molly.
"Besides, I haven't the material or anything."
"Why don't you earn some money, Molly?" suggested Nance. "There are lots
of different ways. Mrs. Murphy, the housekeeper, was telling me about
them. One of the girls here last year actually blacked boots--but, of
course, you wouldn't do anything so menial as that."
"Wouldn't I?" interrupted Molly. "Just watch me. That's a splendid idea,
Nance. It's a fine, honorable labor, as Colonel Robert Wakefield said,
when his wife had to take in boarders."
Molly slipped on the blue muslin.
"It really doesn't make any difference what she wears," thought Nance,
looking at her friend with covert admiration. "She'd be a star in a
crazy quilt."
The two girls hurried down to supper. Molly was thoughtful all through
that conversational meal. Her mind was busy with a scheme by which she
intended to remove that unceasing pressure for funds which bade fair to
be an ever-increasing bugbear to her.
No. 16 on the Quadrangle turned out to be a very luxurious and
comfortable suite of rooms, consisting of quite a large parlor, a little
den or study and a bedroom. Mary Stewart met them at the door in such a
plain dress that at first Molly was deceived into thinking it was just
an ordinary frock until she noticed the lines. And in a few moments
Nance took occasion to inform her that simplicity was one of the most
expensive things in the world, which few people could afford, and
furthermore that Mary Stewart's gray, cottony-looking dress was a dream
of beauty and must have come from Paris.
There were six or seven other girls in the crowd, including that little
bird-like, bright-eyed creature they called "Jennie Wren," whose real
name was Jane Wickham. The only other girl they knew was Judith Blount,
who had been so snubby to Molly the day before about the luggage.
All these girls were musical, as the freshmen were soon to learn, and
belonged to the College Glee Club.
"What a pretty room!" exclaimed Molly to her hostess, after she had been
properly introduced and enthroned in a big tapestry chair, in which she
unconsciously made a most delightful and colorful picture.
"I'm glad you like it. I have some trouble keeping it from getting
cluttered up with 'truck,' as we call it. It's about like Hercules
trying to clean the Augean Stables, I think, but I try and use the den
for an overflow, and only put the things I'm really fond of in here.
That helps some."
"They are certainly lovely," said the young freshman, looking wistfully
at the head of "The Unknown Woman," between two brass candlesticks on
the mantel shelf. On the bookshelves stood "The Winged Victory," and
hanging over the shelves on the opposite side of the room was an immense
photograph of Botticelli's "Primavera." The only other pictures were two
Japanese prints and the only other furniture was a baby grand piano and
some chairs. It was really a delightfully empty and beautiful place, and
Molly felt suddenly strangely crude and ignorant when she recalled the
things she had intended to do to her part of the room at Queen's Cottage
toward beautifying it. She was engaged in mentally clearing them all
out, when a voice at her elbow said:
"Are you thinking of taking the vows, Miss Brown?"
It was Judith Blount, who had drawn up a chair beside her's. There was
something very patronizing and superior in Miss Blount's manner, but
Molly was determined to ignore it, and smiled sweetly into the black
eyes of the haughty sophomore.
"Taking what vows?" she asked.
"Why, I understood you had become a cloistered nun."
Molly flushed. So the story was out. It didn't take long for news to
travel through a girl's college.
"I wasn't cloistered very long," she answered. "And the only vow I took
was never to be caught there again after six o'clock."
"How did you like Epimenides? I hear he's made a great joke of it," she
continued, without waiting for Molly to answer. "He's rather humorous,
you know. Even in his most serious work, it will come out."
"I don't think there was much to joke about," put in Molly, feeling a
little indignant. "I was awfully forlorn and miserable."
"The real joke was that he called you 'little Miss Smith,'" said Judith.
Molly's moods reflected themselves in her eyes just as the passing
clouds are mirrored in two blue pools of water. A shadow passed over her
face now and her eyes grew darker, but she kept very quiet, which was
her way when her feelings were hurt. Then Mary Stewart began to play on
the piano, and Molly forgot all about the sharp-tongued sophomore, who,
she strongly suspected, was trying to be disagreeable, but for what
reason for the life of her Molly could not see.
Never before had she heard any really good playing on the piano, and it
seemed to her now that the music actually flowed from Mary's long,
strong fingers, in a melodious and liquid stream. Other music followed.
Judith sang a gypsy song, in a rich contralto voice, that Molly thought
was a little coarse. Jennie Wren, who could sing exactly like a child,
gave a solo in the highest little piping soprano. Two girls played on
mandolins, and Mary Stewart, who appeared to do most things, accompanied
them on a guitar. Then came supper, which was rather plain, Molly
thought, and consisted simply of tea and cookies. "I suppose it's
artistic not to have much to eat," her thoughts continued, but she made
up her mind to invite Mary Stewart to supper before the old ham and the
hickory nut cake were consumed by hungry freshmen.
"It seems to me that with such a voice as yours you must sing, Miss
Brown," here broke in Mary Stewart. "Will you please oblige the
company?"
"I wouldn't like to sing after all this fine music," protested Molly.
"Besides, I don't know anything but darky songs."
"The very girl we want for our Hallowe'en Vaudeville," cried Jennie
Wren. "What do you use, a guitar or a piano?"
"Either, a little," answered Molly, blushing crimson; "but I haven't any
more voice than a rabbit."
"Fire away," cried Jennie Wren, thrusting a guitar into her hands.
Molly was actually trembling with fright when she found herself the
center of interest in this musical company.
[Illustration: "I'm scared to death," she announced. Then she struck a
chord and began.--_Page 60._]
"I'm scared to death," she announced, as she faintly tuned the guitar.
Then she struck a chord and began:
"Ma baby loves shortnin',
Ma baby loves shortnin' bread;
Ma baby loves shortnin',
Mammy's gwine make him some shortnin' bread."
Before she had finished, everybody in the room had joined in. Then she
sang:
"Ole Uncle Rat has come to town,
To buy his niece a weddin' gown,
OO-hoo!"
"A quarter to ten," announced some one, and the next moment they had all
said good-night and were running as fast as their feet could carry them
across the campus, "scuttling in every direction like a lot of rats," as
Judith remarked.
"Lights out at ten o'clock," whispered Nance breathlessly, as they crept
into their room and undressed in the dark. It was very exciting. They
felt like a pair of happy criminals who had just escaped the iron grasp
of the law.
When Molly Brown dropped into a deep and restful sleep that night, she
never dreamed that she had already become a noted person in college,
though how it happened, it would be impossible to say. It might have
been the Cloister story, but, nevertheless, Molly--overgrown child that
she may have seemed to Professor Green--had a personality that attracted
attention wherever she was.