SOPHOMORES AT LAST.
"Freshman, arise!
Gird on thy sword!
Captivity is o'er.
To arms! To arms!
For, lo! thou art
A daring sophomore!"
The words of this stirring song floated in through the open windows at
Queen's one warm night in early June. Moonlight flooded the campus, and
the air was sweet with the perfume of lilac and syringa.
A group of sophomores had gathered in front of the house to serenade the
freshmen at Queen's, who had immediately repaired to the piazza to
acknowledge this unusual honor paid them by their august predecessors.
"I think it would be far more appropriate if they sang:
"'When all the saints who from their labors rest,'"
remarked Mabel Hinton, who, in order to make a record, had studied
herself into a human skeleton.
"Well," said Molly Brown, "when I left home last September, one of my
brothers cheerfully informed me that I looked like 'a rag and a bone and
a hank of hair.' I am afraid I don't feel very saint-like now, because I
have gained ten pounds, and I'm not tired of anything, except packing my
clothes. I'm so sorry to leave blessed old Queen's that I could kiss her
brown cheek, if it didn't look foolish."
"Well, go and kiss the side of the house then," put in Judy. "You have a
poetic nature, Molly; but I wouldn't have it changed. I like it just as
it is."
"Do you know," interrupted Margaret Wakefield, "that Queen's, from
having once been scorned as a residence, has now become a very popular
abode, and there were so many applications for rooms here for next year
that the registrar has had to make a waiting list for the first time in
connection with Queen's. Think of that at old Queen's!"
"It's because it's the residence of a distinguished person," announced
Molly. "I think we should put a brass plate on the front door, stating
that in this house lived a class president who possessed every attribute
for the office. She was versed in parliamentary law, she had an
executive mind, and she was beloved by all who knew her."
Margaret was pleased at this compliment.
"_Voyons, voyons, que vous me flattez!_" she exclaimed. "It's your warm
Southern nature that makes you so enthusiastic. Now, the real reason why
old brown Queen's, with her moldering vines, is so popular all of a
sudden is because you are here."
It was Molly's turn now to be pleased.
"We won't argue such a personal matter," she said, squeezing Margaret's
hand. "But I'm glad I'm booked here for next year. I was afraid Nance
would want a 'singleton,' she has such a retiring nun-like nature."
"Me?" exclaimed Nance, disregarding English in her amazement. "Why, I've
had the happiest winter of my whole life with you, Molly. If there's a
chance for another one like it, I'm only too thankful."
"Certainly Mary Carmichael Washington Brown is a modest soul," thought
Judy, who happened to know that her friend had had some five or six
tempting offers to move into better quarters the next year at no greater
expense to herself. One was from Mary Stewart, who was to return next
winter for a post-graduate course. Another was from Judith Blount, who
had proposed Molly for membership in the Beta Phi Society next year, and
had furthermore invited the surprised young freshman to take the study
of her apartment for a bedroom and offered her the constant use of her
sumptuous sitting room.
Certainly, if ever there was an expression of true remorse and
repentance, that was one, Molly thought, and the allusion to roommates
reminded her that she must say good-bye to Judith, for there would be no
time in the morning for last farewells.
"I am going over to the Beta Phi house for a minute," she announced.
"Any one want to come along?"
Margaret and Jessie, who had friends in that "abode of fashion," as it
was called, joined her, and presently the three white figures were lost
in the shadows on the campus.
"She is going to say farewell to black-eyed Judith," observed Judy in
a low voice to Nance, "and all I would say is what the colored preacher
said: 'Can the le-o-pard change his spots?'"
Nance smiled gravely. She did not possess Judy's prejudiced nature, but
her convictions were strong.
"Do you think she's a 'le-o-pard,' Judy?" she asked.
"She may be a domesticated one," said Judy, "of the genus known as
'cat.'"
"Aren't you ashamed, Judy?" exclaimed Nance, reprovingly.
But it must be confessed that a few doubts still lurked in her own heart
concerning the sincerity of proud Judith's repentance.
In the meantime, the three freshmen had separated in the upper hall of
the Beta Phi House, and Molly had given a timid rap with Judith's fine
brass knocker.
Instantly the door flew open and she found herself precipitated into a
roomful of people, at least it seemed so at first, who had just subsided
into quiet because some one was going to play.
Molly was about to retreat in great confusion when Miss Grace Green
seized one hand and Mary Stewart the other. Judith came forward with
a show of extreme cordiality and Richard Blount left the piano and
actually ran the full length of the room, exclaiming:
"It's Miss Molly Brown of Kentucky!"
Molly knew she was breaking into a party, but there was nothing to do
but make a call of a few minutes and then take her leave as gracefully
as possible under the circumstances.
Professor Edwin Green had also shaken her by the hand warmly, and
pushing up a chair had insisted on her sitting down. They had all drawn
their chairs around her in a semicircle, and Richard Blount had brought
over the piano stool and placed it directly in front of her so that he
could look straight at her.
In fact, here sat the little freshman, blushing crimson and painfully
embarrassed, enthroned in a large armchair, and gathered around her was
a circle of very delightful, not to say, admiring persons.
As one of these persons was Judith's brother and two were her near
cousins, Molly thought she could explain their excessive cordiality.
They knew the story of the ring and they were anxious to make amends.
She recalled, with a furtive inner smile, the last time she was in those
rooms, when, as a waitress, she had upset the coffee on the Professor's
knees. How glad she was that the painful experience was well over and
forgotten by now. But she was glad about many things that evening. She
was happy to see that Mary and Judith had made up their differences, and
were once more friends. She knew that Mary, who had the kindest heart in
the world, could never stay angry long.
"I didn't know that Judith was giving a party," Molly began, still very
much embarrassed. "I just dropped in to say good-bye because I am
leaving to-morrow morning."
"To-morrow morning?" repeated Richard Blount. "Wasn't it lucky for me
you happened in to-night. I had expected to call on you to-morrow
afternoon, and think how disappointed I should have been to have found
the nest empty and the bird flown."
"So you are really off to-morrow?" broke in Professor Green. "I am so
sorry. I was going to ask you to have tea in the Cloisters with my
sister and me in the afternoon."
Again Molly smiled to herself. Tea in the Cloisters, with a
distinguished professor and his charming sister! Only nine months
before she had been a lonely, shivering little waif of a freshman
locked in the Cloisters. The words of the sophomore "croak" came back
to her:
"They have locked me in the Cloisters;
They have fastened up the gate.
Oh, let me out! Oh, let me out!
It's growing very late."
"I am sorry that my ticket is bought and my berth engaged, and the
expressman coming for my trunk to-morrow at nine," she said. "If all
those things were not so, I should love to drink soup----" she stopped
and flushed a deep red.
What absurd trick of the mind had made her say "soup"? "I mean tea," she
went on hastily, hoping no one had heard the break.
Miss Green was talking with Mary Stewart. Richard Blount was twirling on
the piano stool, his hands deep in his pockets, and Judith was engaged
at a side table in pouring lemonade into glasses.
There was a twinkle of amusement in the Professor's brown eyes, and he
gave Molly a delightful smile.
"I must be going," she said anxiously, rising.
"Not till you've had a glass of lemonade, for I made it myself," said
Richard, gallantly handing her one on a plate.
Molly looked doubtfully toward Judith.
"I don't want to be like that young man in the rhyme," she said.
"'There was a young man so benighted,
He never knew when he was slighted.
He'd go to a party and eat just as hearty,
As if he'd been really invited.'"
Everybody laughed, and Judith suddenly becoming a model hostess,
exclaimed:
"Indeed, you must stay, Molly, and have some lemonade. Richard didn't
make it at all. He only squeezed the lemons."
Molly, therefore, remained and had a beautiful time, and when she really
did take her departure the entire party, including Judith, escorted her
across the moonlit campus to the door of Queen's. But Molly was still
certain that it was the ring episode and nothing else that made them
all so polite and attentive.
And so she informed Nance and Judy that night as she unlocked her trunk
for the third time in ten minutes to stuff in some overlooked belonging.
But Judy sniffed the air and exclaimed:
"Ring, nothing! It's popularity!"
Molly smiled and went to bed, feeling that her last day at Wellington
had been a decided improvement on the first one.
The next morning Queen's Cottage was a pandemonium of trunks and bags
and excited young women, rushing up and down the halls. Cries could be
heard from every room in the house of:
"The laundress hasn't brought my shirtwaists! Perfidious woman!"
"The expressman's here!"
"Is your trunk strapped?"
"I've got to sleep in an upper berth."
"Don't forget to write me."
"Where are you to be this summer?"
"I can't get this top down and the trunk man's waiting!"
"Oh, dear, do hurry! We'll miss the bus!"
"Young ladies, the bus is coming," called the voice of Mrs. Markham from
the front door.
And then, with a fluttering of handkerchiefs and many a last call of
"good-bye," the bus-load of girls moved sedately down the avenue.
Molly, looking back at the twin gray towers of Wellington, understood
why Frances Andrews wanted so much to return.
"How glad I am to be only a sophomore," she cried. "I shall have three
more years at Wellington!"
THE END.
Transcriber's Note: Besides some minor printer's errors the following
correction has been made: on page 172 "Professor" has been changed to
"President" (the doctor at one side, the President at the other).
Otherwise the original has been preserved, including inconsistent
spelling and hyphenation.
End of Project Gutenberg's Molly Brown's Freshman Days, by Nell Speed