Buch lesen: «Marjorie Dean's Romance», Seite 5

CHAPTER XI
A RUSTIC DISASTER

The evening of April eleventh saw Hamilton campus in the possession of a social throng, large, rural and hilarious. The spring twilight was scarcely ready to drop faint lavender shades over departed day when from the various student houses on the big green issued veritable country bumpkins in festival attire. They appeared singly, in twos, threes, quartettes and straggling groups.

Fortunately for the rovingly-inclined bands of rural pleasure-seekers the night was warm and balmy. In the mild fragrant spring air, the giggling maids flaunted their bright calicos and ginghams, unhidden in their cotton glory by shawl, coat or cape.

The gallant swains who dotingly accompanied the flower-hatted or sun-bonneted, aproned ladies were a sturdy, rugged-looking lot in their blue or brown overalls, flannel or gingham shirts, brilliant cotton neck handkerchiefs and wide-brimmed straw field hats or weather-stained sombreros. A few ambitious rustic youths had appeared in their own fond weird conception of party attire. They were amazing and wonderful to behold.

“These happy hecks at Hamilton certainly have small feet,” remarked a stocky rustic in a faded pink gingham shirt, a blue and white checked overall, broad, square-toed low shoes, a bright green neckerchief and a narrow-rimmed, round straw hat with a hole in the crown through which a lock of brown hair appeared, standing straight up. The accompanying mask was a round false face with very red cheeks and high arching brows.

“Well, they can’t help it. If they hide ’em with brogans how can they dance with the lady hecks?” demanded a tall bumpkin in what he was now proudly exhibiting on the campus as “my horse clothes.”

“Te, he he,” giggled the stocky rustic. “Truly, Muriel Harding, I never saw you look so funny before in all my life.”

“Sh-h-h, Jeremiah. I don’t know how you knew me. Since you do, keep it dark. Some horse clothes! Have one of my cards.” Muriel handed Jerry a correspondence card in a violent shade of pink. In the center of it was written: “Horsefield Hanks, Jockey and Post Master, Jayville.”

Jerry continued to giggle at Horsefield Hanks’ gala adornment. It consisted of a bright blue flannel shirt, a broad red leather belt, baggy brown trousers tucked into a pair of boot-modeled goloshes, a rusty black cutaway coat and a red and white striped jockey cap with a wide front peak. The mask was a false face of particularly ferocious expression. To look at Horsefield Hanks was not only to laugh. It was a signal to keep on laughing.

“Where is Marjorie?” Muriel inquired as she turned from bending a killing glance upon two hurrying maids, evidently intent on joining their swains. The two called a mirthful: “Hello, sweetness. Where did your face grow?” and whisked on their way.

“Gone over to the Hall to meet Robin. She has on a fine check yellow and white gingham dress trimmed with little yellow ruffles, white stockings and slippers and a white ruffled organdie hat with long yellow ribbon strings.”

“I’ll certainly know her if I see her. Vera is too cute for words. She has two overalls on, one over the other, to make her look fat. They’re blue and her blouse is white. She has a black alpaca coat on, too. She managed to get hold of a funny little pair of copper-toed boots. She has built them up inside until she is at least three inches taller. She won’t be easily recognized.” Muriel rattled off the description in a low laughing voice. “Ronny has on a pale blue calico. It comes down to her heels. She has black slippers and stockings, a ruffled blue sunbonnet and a white kerchief folded across her shoulders. Lucy’s dressed in the same style except her dress is lavender. Leila is a maid, but I haven’t been able to pick her out yet. Now how in the world did you know that I was I?” Muriel demanded.

“I knew the most ridiculous costume I saw would be yours,” chuckled Jerry. “You’re so funny, you’re positively idiotic.”

“Then I’m likely to win the prize for having the funniest costume. Won’t that be nice? Come on, Hayfoot, that’s what you look like. Let’s go out in the world and hunt up Strawfoot. I presume we’ll be mobbed before we’ve gone far for not having our rustic maids along with us. Anyhow let’s brave the jays and jayesses as long as we can.” Muriel politely offered Jerry an arm. “I’m to meet Candace Oliver at seven-thirty at the Bean holder. I’m a gentleman jockey of leisure until then. The post office was closed early today. Jayville will have to wait for its mail.”

The gallant pair had not proceeded fifty feet from their reconnoitering place before they were surrounded by a crowd of swains and maids and rushed over the green as prisoners to be apportioned to the first two swainless maids the company chanced to encounter.

Meanwhile a rustic gentleman in wearing apparel becoming to one of his lowly station had just made a very stealthy entrance to the campus from the extreme eastern gates. He had cautiously stepped from a smart black roadster which was parked a little way from the gates, but well off the highway. Before he had ventured to step from the car he had left the steering seat and disappeared into the tonneau of the machine, then simply a motorist in a voluminous leather motor coat, goggles and a leather cap.

From the back of the car had presently emerged a typical jay in blue overalls, and a loud-plaided, collarless, gingham shirt of green, blue and red mixture. He wore a turkey-red handkerchief, knotted about the neck, an immense flopping hat of yellowish straw, white socks and carpet slippers with worsted embroidered fronts. In one hand he clutched firmly a huge red and yellow striped umbrella. The mask, which Leslie had ordered sent to her from New York, was a very pink and white face, utterly insipid, with three flat golden curls pasted on the low forehead. Its expression, one of cheerful idiocy, was as distinctly as mirth-inspiring as was the fierce face of Horsefield Hanks. In fact it would have been hard to decide which of the two get-ups was the funnier.

One swift glance about her to assure herself of a clear coast and Leslie made a dash for the campus gates. She was through the gateway in a twinkling. She did not stop until she had put a little distance between herself and the gates. Then she paused, turned, critically surveyed the highway, the portion of the campus immediate to her and lastly her car. She was hardly content to leave it there, but there was no other way. It was well out of the path of other machines, either coming or going on the pike. She could but hope that no one would make off with it. She reflected with a wry smile that there were still a few more cars to be bought, though she might happen to lose that one. As usual she was prepared to pay lavishly for her fun.

She hurried straight on across the campus past Silverton Hall and in the direction of Acasia House. It was the most remote from the gymnasium of all the campus houses. She and Doris had agreed to meet there, making the appointment late enough to miss Acasia House rustics when they should set out for the gymnasium. Doris had telephoned her that afternoon and made the final arrangement for their rendezvous. They were to meet behind a huge clump of lilac bushes just budding into leaf.

As she came abreast of the lilac bushes a dainty figure in white dimity, imprinted with bunches of violets stepped forth to meet her. Doris’s charming frock had a wide dimity sash and her dimity hat, trimmed with bunches of silk violets, had long violet ribbon strings. She wore flat-heeled black kid slippers and white silk stockings of which only a glimpse showed beneath her long gown.

One look at Leslie’s inane false face and she burst into laughter. “Such a face!” she gasped mirthfully. “The funniest one I’ve seen since I left the Hall tonight.”

Leslie lifted the spreading hat and disclosed to Doris a yellow wig which matched the curls pasted to her mask. “My face is my fortune,” she announced humorously.

“It’s too funny for words. I’m almost afraid we may be rushed.” Doris cast an anxious glance at the not far distant crowd.

“Am I so funny as all that?” Leslie asked in gratification.

“You are quite extraordinarily funny,” Doris assured. “The crowd on the campus has been going it strong ever since dinner. They’re awfully frisky. Once they get into the gym they’ll be wanting to dance. Then we won’t be in danger. There’s to be a prize given for the funniest costume. Too bad you can’t stay in the gym long enough to win it.”

“Oh, I don’t want it. I only want a little fun,” Leslie said.

Warily the pair skirted the crowd and went on to the gymnasium. Leslie’s funny face immediately challenged the attention of a number of frisky couples parading the great room. They began flocking about herself and Doris, asking foolish questions in a gleeful effort to learn her identity. She remained mute for which Doris was thankful. Her vacant smiling mask merely continued to beam upon her hilarious questioners.

The Hamtown Gilt Medal Band and Orkestry were already in their corner, importantly ensconced behind a white pasteboard picket fence. They alone of the ruralites were unmasked. They were simple geniuses of music in overalls, gay-checked shirts and high-crowned haying hats of rough straw, speckled green and red. Strings of richly gilded pasteboard medals struggled across each musician’s manly chest; they testified eloquently of past musical achievement. A large gilt-lettered sign, high on a standard flaunted the proud legend: “We have won all the medals in Hamtown for the past forty years. The only other band was a hand organ. Notice our decorations.”

The leader and first violin of this renowned group of musicians was tall and rather blonde, with an imposing blonde goatee and an artistic sweep of curled blonde mustache. His companion players were hardly less well supplied with whiskers, mustaches and even side burns. In direct apposition to the rustic youths of the community of Hamtown they presented a decidedly mature, dignified appearance. They seemed complacently well aware of their musical superiority over their humbler companions and gave themselves plenty of airs.

At intervals about the spacious gym were little open booths where popcorn fritters, salted peanuts, stick candy, apples and oranges, molasses taffy and pink lemonade were sold. In each booth a masked rustic maid presided, keeping a lynx eye on her wares.

After the orchestra had tuned up with considerable scraping, sawing and tooting they burst into the rallying strains of the grand march. Doris heard the sound of the music with patent relief. She had grown more and more uneasy for fear that Leslie might forget her role of silence and blurt out a remark in her characteristic fashion. Anyone who had known her in the past would be likely to recognize her voice.

Doris had suggested that it would be better for they two to dance together the few numbers before the unmasking for which Leslie dared remain. To this Leslie would not hear. She craved freedom to roam about the gymnasium by herself and dance with whom she fancied. She and Doris walked through the grand march together and danced the first number. Then Leslie left Doris, who was being singled out by two or three husky farmer boys for attention, and strolled down the gymnasium, her striped umbrella under one arm.

Behind the fatuously-smiling blonde face her small dark eyes were keeping a bright watch on the revelers. She wondered where Bean and her Beanstalks were and tried to pick them out by height and figure. She decided that a maid in a pale pink lawn frock was Marjorie and promptly kept away from her. When the music for the second dance began she made her bow to a slim sprite in fluffy white who accepted with a genuine freshie giggle.

Encouraged by her success as a beau Leslie danced the next and still the next, each time with a different partner. She was a good dancer, and led with a sureness and ease quite masculine. After a couple of turns about the room Leslie had been obliged to discard her umbrella. She had boldly set it up inside the orchestra’s picket fence where it would be less likely to attract the attention of prankish wags.

At the beginning of the fifth dance Leslie was not yet ready to go. She glanced at the wall clock which stood at five minutes to nine. It was still too early for unmasking. She believed herself safe for at least two more dances after the one about to begin. She started toward a group of two or three disengaged maids.

Suddenly from the farther end of the gymnasium a cry arose which Leslie mistook for “Unmask.” It threw her into a panic. She forgot in her dismay that Doris had said the signal for unmasking would be the blast of a whistle. What she remembered instead was her striped umbrella. She was only a few steps from the orchestra corner. She made a frantic rush to it, reached over the low picket fence and snatched up the umbrella. She turned away, not noticing that she had laid low a section of the fence. She hurried across the floor, bent only on reaching the door.

“Oh!” A forceful exclamation went up as she crashed against a couple who had begun to dance. The force of the collision fairly took the breath of all three girls. Leslie made an unintentional backward step. The umbrella slid from under her arm toward the floor just as the jostled swain and his lady were about to move on. It tripped the rustic gallant neatly and he sprawled forward full length on the highly waxed floor, dragging his partner with him.

CHAPTER XII
A RANK OUTSIDER

“What a clumsy creature you are!” The fallen gallant scrambled up from the floor and delivered the opinion in a feminine voice. It was shrill and wrathful. It rose in its shrillness above the rhythmic melody of the orchestra. “It’s both inconsiderate and dangerous in you to carry such a large umbrella onto the floor. Your face and your behavior go nicely together.”

“Beg your pardon for upsetting you, but keep your opinion to yourself.” Leslie began the reply with forced politeness, but ended her words almost in a hiss. Behind her simpering mask she was a dark fury. “I never allow anyone to speak in that tone to me.”

“How do you propose to prevent my saying what I please?” came back tauntingly from the belligerent swain. His partner, a slender, graceful figure in a pale yellow gingham gown placed a gently arresting hand on her angry gallant’s arm. It was shaken off with instant hateful impatience.

“I don’t propose to do that. Nothing short of a clamp could keep you from shrieking.” Leslie had changed in a twinkling to rude insolence. “I’ll have mercy on my ear drums and beat it.”

“Wha-a-t?” The angry swain’s voice had suddenly changed key. It had lowered in a mixture of amazed, disapproving conviction.

The utterance of that one amazed word acted upon Leslie like a sudden dash of cold water. She wheeled and swaggered on down the room with an air of elaborate unconcern. It was entirely make-believe. Her heart was thumping with dismay. She had spoken after having vowed within herself that whatever might happen at the romp she would remain mute. More, she was afraid she had been recognized by the student whom she had unwittingly tripped up with her umbrella. Something in those higher pitched tones had sounded familiar. She could not then remember, however, of whom they reminded her.

She had turned away from the quarrel just in time. Attracted by the commotion at that part of the gymnasium more than one pair of dancers had steered toward the accident center. Some of these now headed Leslie off in her perturbed journey down the room. They collected about her with mischievous intent, hemming her in and calling out to her.

“Such a pretty boy!” “Hello, April smiles!” “Wait a minute, puddeny-woodeny!” “I’m crazy about you!” were some of the pleasantries hurled at her. Under other circumstances Leslie would have laughed at the extravagances. Now she was growing worried for her own security from identification. She was now in precisely the situation against which Doris had warned her. Suppose the call to unmask were to come just then? She resolved desperately that, unheeding it, she would bolt for the door.

Meanwhile the tripped-up rustic was sputtering to his dainty partner in a manner which indicated trouble to come for Leslie.

“I wouldn’t stand such insolence from another student, much less from an intruder,” Julia Peyton was saying wrathfully. “I wouldn’t – ”

“Try to forget the matter, Miss Peyton,” urged a soft voice.

“I shan’t. Who are you, and how do you happen to know me?” demanded Julia rudely. “You don’t know who that mask is. I do. She has no invitation or right to be here tonight. It’s against all Hamilton tradition. Doris Monroe is to blame for this outrage. She has helped that horrid Miss Ca – ”

“I am Miss Dean, Miss Peyton,” came the interruption, low, but vibrating with sternness. “You will please not mention the name you were going to say.”

“I’ll do as I please about that. I’ll do more. I’ll expose that Miss Cairns before she has a chance to leave here. I know who’s to blow the whistle for unmasking. She is a sophie friend of mine. I’ll ask her to blow it now. Then we’ll see what Miss Cairns will do.”

Before Marjorie could stop her she had started up the room on a hunt for the sophomore who had been detailed to blow the unmasking whistle. A dismayed glance after Julia, then Marjorie followed her. There was but one thing she could do. She must follow Julia and discover to which sophomore had been intrusted the signal detail. Each class had been given a certain amount of the details for the romp. Among sophomore details was the sounding of the unmasking signal.

Unaware that she was being followed by Marjorie, Julia had gone on a tour of the room, searching this way and that, with spiteful eagerness. She now had a stronger motive for exposing Leslie than the latter’s offense against tradition. She was determined to be even with Doris for having “almost” snubbed her on numerous occasions. It would not reflect to Doris’s credit to be named as the student who had smuggled into the gym a girl who had been expelled from Hamilton.

The sophomore who was to blow the whistle was Jane Everest. Dressed in a befrilled frock of apricot dotted swiss, Jane formed a bright spot of color among the pale blues and pinks which was easily picked out. Julia had little trouble locating her. Marjorie, now not more than three yards behind Julia, reached the pair almost as soon as Julia hailed Jane. The two had met before that evening. Each knew the other’s costume.

“Who do you think is here tonight?” Julia caught Jane’s arm. This time she took the precaution of whispering to her. “Leslie Cairns,” she answered before Jane could speak. “Isn’t that outrageous. I want you to blow the whistle this instant. She’s down there in the middle of a crowd. She won’t be able to get free of it. She must be exposed Jane. It’s necessary to the interest of the whole college that she should be sternly dealt with. Imagine her sneaking in here under the cover of a mask.”

“Why – That is really dreadful, Julia,” Jane whispered back. “Are you sure? Some of the freshies don’t want the whistle blown until ten o’clock. The committee says it had better be after the next dance. I ought to do as they wish, you know. Where is she?”

“Down there.” Julia nodded sulkily toward a group of enjoying wags at the far end of the gymnasium. Those who composed it were finding more sport in teasing Leslie than in dancing.

Marjorie was waiting until Julia should have finished whispering to the apricot mask before soliciting the latter’s attention. She was uneasily watching the fun going on around Leslie. She could not be sure that the mask to whom Julia was whispering was the one to blow the unmasking whistle. For all she knew Julia might have stopped to cite her grievance to one of her particular friends.

“Is she that ridiculous, silly-faced mask?” Jane cried. “She’s awfully droll.”

“I fail to see it.” Julia was haughtily contradictory. “Will you please blow the whistle now, Jane? You know she shouldn’t be here.”

“Please pardon me, I must speak to you.” Marjorie had made up her mind to act. If the apricot mask were the soph detailed to blow the whistle, then she must be asked to delay blowing it until Leslie could be steered from the gym without discovery. If she were not the one appointed Marjorie decided that she would hurry down to Leslie and inform her of the danger.

“You have no – ” Julia began angrily.

“I am Miss Dean,” ignoring Julia, Marjorie serenely continued. “Will you please tell me who you are?”

“Yours truly, Jane Everest, Marjorie.” A little laugh rippled out from behind the concealing mask.

“Oh, Jane!” There was inexpressible relief in the exclamation. “I’m so glad it’s you. Are you the soph who is to blow the unmasking whistle? If you are, don’t blow it for at least ten minutes yet.”

“I insist that Miss Everest shall blow it, and at once,” burst forth Julia Peyton furiously. “She has just promised me that she will.”

“No, I haven’t promised to blow the whistle at once, Julia,” Jane steadily corrected.

“What right have you to interfere in our fun? Post graduates are not supposed to interest themselves too closely in class affairs.” Julia tossed her head in withering disdain of Marjorie. “What right have you to prevent me from exposing that detestable Miss Cairns. Do you consider it honorable or fair to the traditions of Hamilton to permit a former student who was expelled to come on the campus socially?”

“How do you know, Miss Peyton, that Miss Cairns, a former student of Hamilton, is present in the gymnasium, or has been here this evening?” Marjorie inquired with a cool evenness that made Julia gasp. “Have you seen her?”

“I know, and so do you. Didn’t she trip us with her umbrella? Didn’t we hear her voice. I recognized it. You may not have.” The answer was freighted with sarcasm.

“A masker carrying an umbrella tripped us. When she spoke her voice sounded like that of Miss Cairns,” Marjorie stated impersonally. “I did not see the masker’s face. Did you?”

“What difference does that make?” sharply countered Julia. “We both recognized her by her voice.”

“Since we did not see her face how can we be sure that we recognized her. Lacking the evidence of our own eyes our best plan is to launch no accusations against Miss Cairns. Jane,” Marjorie turned to the sophomore, “when are you going to blow the unmasking whistle?”

“After the next dance. This dance is ending now, I think.” Jane turned momentary attention to the music, which was beating to a syncopated end. “That is the time the floor committee has set. I can change it if you like, Marjorie.”

“No, thank you. That suits me nicely. I must go now, but I’ll see you soon after unmasking, Jane.” With a slight, courteous inclination of the head to Miss Peyton, Marjorie walked composedly down the great room to where Leslie stood, still surrounded.

Marjorie had not spoken to Leslie Cairns more than two or three times during the long period of time in which they had been students together at Hamilton. She had never spoken to Leslie since Leslie had been away from the college. She now wondered what she could say to the uninvited masker which might not be too humiliating to her.