Part 14

Among all her classmates Julia was the only one to whom she would have been at all willing to confide her trouble, and yet Julia was the very one to whom she could not go, because Julia was the one who might have helped her. To have told Julia of her difficulty would have seemed to her too much like asking a favor—an impossible thing to one of her proud spirit.

Lois carried her burden without speaking of it for several days. She meant to say nothing until the mid-years were over. She intended to keep up her courage to the end. She studied all the harder, for she meant these mid-year examinations to be the best that she had ever had. She meant to reach the highest possible mark. For although she intended to return to college when she had saved enough money, she knew that happy day might yet be some distance away. One day soon after she had received the letter that had so disturbed her, Lois remained rather late at Fay House. She had been at work in the library, for the next day the examinations would begin, and it happened that the most important was to come on that first morning. At home that evening she would finish the review of a certain very important book. She felt that she had not yet given it sufficient attention, and she realized that much depended on her understanding two or three difficult chapters. Passing through the hall where groups of merry girls were coming out from some Freshman celebration in the Auditorium, Lois, with a head throbbing from hard study, decided to walk for a mile or two before taking the car. As she walked along trying to solve a problem that touched on her examination, forgetting for the time the more personal cares that had weighed her down lately, she turned into a side street that took her a little out of her course. In the spring and early autumn she was fond of this street, because of two or three old-fashioned gardens upon whose quaint flowers she loved to gaze. The street was lonely and the houses far apart, and Lois began to walk more rapidly. In the faint light, for it was now almost dark, Lois paused for a moment to look over the fence of one of the old gardens. Near a tall tree in the corner in summer there was a bed of lilies of the valley that she had often stopped to admire. Now as she leaned absent-mindedly on the fence for a minute, she thought that she heard a groan as of some one in pain. Hastily pushing open the gate she heard the sounds growing louder as she approached the house. There were no lights in the windows, but stepping bravely up on the little piazza she entered the half-open door. She stumbled as she entered, and reaching down she touched a warm, breathing face.

“Help me!” cried a faint voice, and then another deep groan. A faint light came from a back room, and Lois, quick-witted, hurried in there, and in a second returned with matches. When she had lit the gas-jet in the hall, she saw that the sufferer was an elderly woman whom she had often noticed in the garden, and had seen occasionally at Radcliffe functions. Lois was tall and strong, and the sufferer was slight, so without delay she lifted her to a couch in the sitting-room.

“It’s my foot,” moaned the sufferer.

“I’ll go for a doctor at once,” said Lois, “but first I must put on a cold compress. It’s evidently a bad sprain. There seem to be no bones broken,” she concluded, finishing her examination.

Stripping up a cover from a pillow in an easy-chair, and finding her way to the running water in the kitchen, Lois made the bandage and put it on with a professional air.

Few words had passed between them, but as she left the room, “Dr. Brown,” said the sick woman.

“Yes,” responded Lois, “I was going for him.”

It was not far to the physician’s house, and when he had examined the foot he pronounced it, as Lois had, merely a bad sprain.

“My maid won’t be back until eleven o’clock,” said the sick woman. “I let her go to Woburn.”

“I can get a nurse,” responded the doctor. “You mustn’t be left alone.”

“I won’t have a nurse about me. You’ve often heard me say that,” cried Miss Ambrose petulantly.

“But you can’t be left alone,” rejoined the doctor firmly.

Miss Ambrose looked at Lois appealingly.

“Let me stay with you!” exclaimed Lois impulsively, forgetting her examinations, forgetting the important review, forgetting everything but the fact that before her lay a suffering human being whom she might help.

“Would I be of use?” she asked, when the doctor did not immediately reply.

“Of use!” he exclaimed. “I should say so; a girl who knows just what to do with a sprained ankle.”

So it was arranged that a telegram at Miss Ambrose’s expense should be sent to Lois’ family, saying that she would stay all night, and the physician’s name, Lois knew, would assure her mother that it was a case of necessity. “Illness of a friend,” he had put in the telegram, leaving it to Lois to make explanations when she reached home.

After the doctor left, the sick woman lay silent with her eyes closed—whether half asleep or not Lois could not tell. She had refused Lois’ offer of assistance in putting her to bed, saying that she would be more comfortable on the lounge until her maid should come.

As Lois watched her lying there, her regular features outlined against the pillow, her pale face looking even paler, surrounded with a mass of sandy, gray-streaked hair, the strangeness of the situation occurred to her, as it had not at first. Then she began to realize that she ought not to play Good Samaritan at this time, for it came back to her with overpowering force that this was the eve of an examination, that she really depended on these last few hours of review. Well! there was no reason why she should not study here, though the light was rather dim.

As she turned toward the door to bring her books from a table in the hall, Miss Ambrose started.

“Don’t leave me!” she cried.

“No, no, indeed.” Lois had quickly returned with the book under her arm.

“You are a student,” said the invalid, now wide awake. “I have often seen you pass with your books under your arm. Where is your school?”

“It’s Radcliffe.”

“Oh, how I envy you!” and Miss Ambrose sighed. “When I was your age I would have given all—”

A twinge of pain prevented her finishing the sentence. Lois laid down the book, and, lifting the coverlid, moved the foot to an easier position.

Again Miss Ambrose closed her eyes, and Lois, turning down the light, sat and watched her a little longer. It was now half-past seven and Lois felt faint. She had had nothing to eat since breakfast, except a light luncheon. Passing to the kitchen for the water for the compress, she had seen dishes piled on the table, and she judged that Miss Ambrose had had an early tea. Then Miss Ambrose opened her eyes.

“Perhaps you would like to study now; the light will not disturb me.”

“Thank you,” responded Lois. “I really need all the time I can have. I have an examination in psychology to-morrow.”

“Then pray go on without considering me. It is a great relief to me to know that you are here. But I feel so drowsy that if I fall asleep I am sure that you will excuse me.”

In a short time Miss Ambrose seemed to be really asleep, and Lois bent over her books with great zeal.

The examination in psychology was one that would require a cool head.

“Explain the utility of cerebral hemispheres.” Lois turned from the test question to her note-book. She was able to answer it satisfactorily. “In the lectures mental life was several times described as a ‘collection of interests.’ Explain the phrase, and give the chief reasons for holding it to be a true description of at least a great part of mental life.” This, too, Lois found no difficulty in answering. But occasionally she came to a question that needed something more than either memory or her lecture notes. She exerted herself to the utmost. But alas! the more she studied, the more she realized that she had the greatest need of her text-book, and this she had left at home. It was too large a book to carry back and forward to Fay House, for she had felt that she would do best to spend the last hours in a careful study of its pages.

It was nine o’clock when Lois made this discovery, and Miss Ambrose had not awaked. Lois blamed herself for not giving her college work first place in her mind when she made her offer to stay with Miss Ambrose. But Lois, in her way, was a philosopher, and since she could not have what she needed the most, she resolved to do the best possible with what she had. She devoted herself, therefore, to her note-book, and tested her knowledge of the subject with various specimen examination papers of past years. It was brain-consuming work, and Lois was so absorbed in it that she did not hear the maid when she opened the front door with her key.

“Sakes alive!” exclaimed the maid, amazed at this late hour to see a stranger seated at the centre table, while her mistress reclined on the lounge. Her loud tone woke Miss Ambrose, who at once began to explain the situation.

“I started upstairs, after going to the front door for my paper, and when I reached the top I remembered that I had left the door half open. Some way I slipped as I turned around, and fell the whole way. If it hadn’t been for this young lady I might have been there yet with my foot twisted under me,” and Miss Ambrose raised her hand to her eyes, greatly disturbed by the thought of what might have been. “She’s going to stay all night,” she added, after a moment’s pause. “See that the spare room’s ready.”

“Yes’m, but I wonder if the young lady mightn’t like something to eat before going to bed.”

“Bless me,” said Miss Ambrose, almost attempting to rise from her couch. “I dare say the child hasn’t had any tea. I’d had mine before she came, but I never thought to ask her.”

“I should think not,” responded Lois, “with your lame foot.”

But pressed for an answer, she admitted that she had eaten little since breakfast, and when Dr. Brown returned at eleven, he found Lois at a side table with a cup of chocolate and a plate of bread and sliced cold beef before her. With his help Miss Ambrose was carried to her room upstairs, and he assured her that with patience and the care that Maggie would give her, he knew that she would soon be herself again.

“How soon?” asked Miss Ambrose anxiously.

“Well,” he replied cautiously, “it’s a matter of weeks rather than months, but I can hardly undertake to say precisely how long it will take.”

As Lois went to the room prepared for her the doctor gave her a word of commendation for her kindness to Miss Ambrose. “Your bandage had a professional touch,” he said.

“Thank you,” she responded, “you know I wish to study medicine.”

“So I’ve heard,” replied Dr. Brown, who had a slight acquaintance with Lois’ family, “although you understand, I suppose, that it’s a long and hard road, especially for a woman.”

“Oh, yes,” she said, less cheerfully, perhaps, than her wont. Indeed, as she sat in Miss Ambrose’s quaintly furnished spare room, the professional course for which she hoped seemed farther away than ever. With one last glance at her notes before she went to bed, she heard the clock strike twelve before she fell asleep. In the morning she woke early, and was again at her work, with a sigh for the text-book which she could not see until she reached Fay House, where there was a copy in the library. It was hardly seven when Maggie knocked on the door, to say that breakfast would be ready at eight, and that Miss Ambrose would be glad to see her at any time.

“You have been very kind indeed to stay with me, and you must promise to come to see me as soon as you can. I shall certainly be here for the next two or three weeks.” Miss Ambrose smiled faintly.

“Yes, it’s too bad.” The voice of Lois had the ring of true sympathy. “The next two or three weeks will be pretty busy for me, as all the mid-years come then, you know. But I shall drop in, in passing, for I shall be very anxious to see how you are getting along.”

“Thank you, it will please me so. There is so much that I wish to ask about the college. When I was young there were no colleges for girls, and my parents would not have let me go away from home. But I had a brother fitting for college, and by myself I studied just the same things that he did. How I envied him his chances! Ah! he didn’t half appreciate them.” Then Miss Ambrose paused, as if weighed down by sad memories. “Well, afterwards my mother tried to get permission for me to study at Harvard, or even to have examinations on subjects that I had studied at home. But it was useless. Nothing could be done about it, although we had relatives in the Faculty and many influential friends.”

“Did they approve of your wishing to go?”

“Well, not altogether. In fact, some of them thought me bold to talk about it. But—well, I’m glad that the girls of this generation have the chance that I longed for.”

Later Lois learned from those who knew Miss Ambrose that she was really a very accomplished woman, and that she had studied many subjects under eminent professors. The brother, who had had the chance for which she had vainly longed, had not turned out well, and had had to leave college without his degree. Ill-health in later years had somewhat interfered with Miss Ambrose’s studying, and she had a wistful expression, such as one often notes on the faces of those who have missed their highest ambition.

Lois, walking down to Fay House in the fresh morning air, thought of the contrariness of Fate. Here was Miss Ambrose, who so evidently might have afforded the luxury of a Harvard course, had this been a possibility in her youth, and here was she, Lois, longing for it, yet likely to be debarred from completing her work from the mere need of a little money. But brushing these thoughts aside, as unworthy a sensible girl, Lois returned to her psychology, and mentally worked out a problem or two before she reached Fay House.

XXII ANNABEL AND CLARISSA

The skating this winter of Julia’s Junior year was unusually good, and during late January and early February crowds went each afternoon to Fresh Pond. Julia, Ruth, Polly, and Clarissa were particularly zealous, and they were all fine skaters. Annabel excelled them all, and none were unwilling to admit her superiority. During her residence abroad she had spent a winter at Copenhagen, and she could accomplish all kinds of wonderful feats learned there in a most graceful way.

“If she were as genuine in other things as in this, we wouldn’t criticise her so, would we, Julia?” and Polly linked her arm in Julia’s for another turn round the pond.

Annabel, indeed, distanced some of the Harvard youths who hung about her. It pleased her to show that she did not need their assistance.

Skating was Annabel’s one outdoor accomplishment, for she was not generally fond of athletics. One afternoon a dozen or more Seniors were up at Fresh Pond. Clarissa skated almost as well as Annabel, but Polly and Julia were less expert, although they were both better skaters than Ruth. “Don’t go over by the ice-houses,” cried Polly, skimming past Julia and Clarissa. “There’s a thin place there and they are just going to rope it off. I was asked to warn everybody.”

“Oh, we know it is thin, thank you,” responded Julia.

“Yes,” added Polly, “only a goose would skate over there; any one can see it’s thin, the ice is so dark. Only a goose would skate near it—or a person who was absorbed in showing off,” and she pointed toward the dangerous spot, which Annabel was approaching.

“Didn’t you warn her?” asked Clarissa, turning to Polly. “You passed her on the way.”

“I’m afraid I didn’t. I was thinking only of you.”

“Oh, Annabel knows so much, she would have known the ice wasn’t thin, even if you had told her.”

But even while they spoke, Clarissa had started off at full speed, and as the others turned to watch her they saw Annabel on the very edge of the dark ice. Polly knew that this was the dangerous place, and called out loudly to Julia to follow her. These things take almost as long in the telling as in the happening, and before Julia and Polly could reach the other two, Annabel had gone through the ice just as Clarissa had almost overtaken her. Without a moment’s hesitation Clarissa threw herself into the chasm, and for a moment it looked as if she would only make a bad matter worse. But Clarissa knew that they were near the shore, and that with even a few strokes she could get herself into shallow water. She had thrown off her coat as she ran, and her arms were unencumbered. Moreover, she had felt justified in making the bold plunge, because she had seen several young men approaching from the crowd of skaters at the opposite end of the pond. Dragging Annabel somewhat roughly then, she struggled on toward the bank, and to her great joy she soon found her feet touching the bottom. Ready hands were stretched out to her from the shore, where already a crowd had assembled, and indeed two youths had plunged into the water to help her support Annabel. The latter was altogether overcome by the shock. Although she had not exactly fainted, she was so benumbed as to be helpless. But for Clarissa’s quick action she might have suffered much more. Hardly were they out of the water when a student returned with a sleigh, whose driver he had stopped in passing. The two drenched girls were bundled under the robes, and taken to a house not far away. Julia and Polly drove quickly down to Cambridge for fresh clothes, and before sunset Annabel and Clarissa were back in their own rooms. Annabel, however, really suffered from her mishap. She had struck her head on the ice in falling, and in consequence a slight fever set in which at first seemed rather serious. Her friends kept her room filled with flowers, and all her classmates showed great sympathy when it was rumored that she might have to drop out of the class for the rest of the year. Clarissa had never fully realized Annabel’s unfriendliness, and so when the latter sent for her she was only too glad to go to see her. She thought that Annabel’s thanks were warmer than they need have been, for Clarissa assured her that she had really been in little danger, and that even without her help, she would not have been long in the water. Annabel in her rôle of invalid, reclining in an easy-chair, with her room filled with flowers, was indeed picturesque.

“Some day,” she said faintly, “when I feel a little stronger I must have a long talk with you. I feel that I have done you an injustice.”

“Nonsense,” replied Clarissa, “I am sure that you have not.”

“Well,” sighed Annabel, “I will tell you sometime. It is hard now to explain.”

“Oh, I rather think that I can wait, if you can. You make me think of Pamela, whose conscience is always too active to be healthy,” rejoined Clarissa, with a smile.

“Ah!” exclaimed Annabel dramatically, “you will believe me when I tell you all, but not now. Yet believe that I shall feel forever indebted to you.”

“Yes, yes,” responded Clarissa, “if it makes you happier to put it that way. But really—” Here they were interrupted by the arrival of other callers, and Clarissa soon took her departure. She had only a vague idea of Annabel’s meaning, although she thought that she undoubtedly had some reference to the publication of Professor Z’s lecture.

She did not permit herself to dwell long on a subject that concerned herself so entirely. Recitations were to begin again in a few days, and she was very anxious to have a meeting of the class called to consider the question of the Presidency of the Idler. It was the custom to appoint to this office the girl who had been Vice-President in the Junior year. It happened, however, that Regina Andrews, the girl now in office, had announced her intention of spending the next year in Europe instead of in the regular work of the Senior year. Polly and Clarissa, therefore, had at once begun to work up a strong sentiment in favor of Lois.

Lois, had she known of their well-meant efforts, would probably have stopped them by explaining that she herself had lost not merely the prospect of being a Senior, but even of finishing the work of her Junior year.

She had agreed to take the position in the Village High School, twenty miles away, and she was to go there February 15th. Until the opening of the recitation period at the close of the mid-years, she intended to say nothing about her changed plans.

Yet Clarissa and Polly could not help seeing that she took little interest when they told her of Regina Andrews’ resignation from the Vice-Presidency.

“We’re bound you shall have it, Lois. We think that you are the very best girl for the place.”

“There’s Julia.”

“Yes, we’d all like Julia, but she says that nothing would induce her to take it. She hates presiding, and she has made us promise not even to let her name come up. She is particularly anxious to have you,” and Polly’s tone would have been convincing to any one but a girl who had put a task upon herself in which class honors had no part. There had been times, of course, when popularity and the thought of being Idler President would have given her a great joy. But now—ah! in a day or two Polly and Clarissa would know just how matters stood.

On Saturday Julia invited her to luncheon, and afterwards they were going to town to a concert. Ruth had gone home over Sunday, as had been her habit this year.

“I’m perfectly delighted, Lois, that you are to be the next Idler President, for Polly says that there isn’t a shadow of a doubt. She has been so determined that the office should not go to Annabel that she has turned into a regular wire-puller. Even Annabel’s illness has made little difference to her, although I think that Clarissa has a more friendly feeling toward her.”

“There!” exclaimed Lois, “I must talk seriously with Polly and Clarissa. I have told them that I could not stand, but they won’t believe me.”

“But why, Lois, why should you not take the office if it comes to you? You preside so well, and you are not timid, as I am, and—”

“Because, Julia”—Lois knew now that it was best to explain the whole matter—“because I may not be here next year.”

Then in as few words as possible, Lois told Julia that loss of money and other things made it expedient for her to take a year or more away from college.

“I cannot bear to be counted out of this class, but there is no help for it.”

Julia very wisely did not attempt to dissuade Lois from her purpose of teaching, although already a little plan had begun to form in her mind. Yet she was sympathetic, and told Lois that it was simply impossible to think of the class as ready to graduate without her.

“Why, we’ll all have to stay out a year, just to keep up with you,” she said.

But in her own room that evening, Julia pondered long over the perversity of Fate, that hampered girls like Jane and Pamela and Lois, who loved study for its own sake, while many others were able to glide through college with no thought of the great privileges that were open to them. “The worst of it is, the girls whom one would like to help are always the proudest.” Then Julia put her mind on the subject, and decided that if she could help it Lois should not leave college.