"This necklace is mine!" returned the accused girl excitedly.
Her eyes flashed, she quivered with anger. No one would have believed that the girl who always appeared calm, and rarely spoke, unless spoken to, could show such fire. One could not guess how the scene would have ended, but just at that moment a slight sound made both girls turn.
There in the doorway stood Mrs. Marvin.
"I am very sorry to see anything so rude, so unkind, and so unjust," she said.
"You were hopelessly rude to rush into another girl"s room and accuse her, even if she were at fault.
"You were unkind, because you spoke as harshly as possible, and you were unjust, because here in my hand I have your own amber beads that one of the maids has just found.
"You must apologize at once, ask Patience if she will forgive you, and in your own room, try to think of some kind way to make amends."
Lina was crying now.
[Ill.u.s.tration: "THIS NECKLACE IS MINE!" RETURNED THE ACCUSED GIRL EXCITEDLY.--_Page 111._]
"Oh, I"m so sorry. Why do I never think before I say horrid things?
Forgive me, Patience, if you can. I"ll gladly do anything for you."
Then the surprise came.
Patience, the silent, shy girl, threw her arms about the younger girl, and held her close.
"The necklace that I have on was given to me by Aunt Millicent. I"ve never worn it. It is beautiful, but I like quiet colors. The showy things are prettier for other girls, I think. I heard Lina say that she had lost hers, and I was just thinking that I would give mine to her, when she rushed in, and--I hadn"t a chance to tell her. That"s all," she said simply.
"Oh, I was worse even than I thought," cried Lina, "and to think, Mrs.
Marvin, that she was planning to give her necklace to me!"
"Promise me, Lina, that after this you will be less quick to accuse."
"Indeed I will, and Patience, if you"ll let me, I"d like to be your friend."
"I"m sometimes lonely. I need you, Lina," Patience said, gently.
Lina never did anything by halves. She told her cla.s.smates how just at the time that Patience had been planning to give her own necklace to make up for Lina"s loss, she had been harshly accused. She told how sweetly forgiving Patience had been, and wound up by stating that hereafter they were to be chums.
Mrs. Marvin, on the way to her own apartment, vaguely wondered what the next happening would be.
"I wonder if the entire week is to be a series of disturbances," she thought. "To be sure, there are but two days more, Friday and Sat.u.r.day, but I should not be surprised if some one started something, so as to make the week complete."
It certainly had been a record week for petty annoyances, and to cap the climax on Friday, after lunch, Miss Fenler waited in the hall, near the door that led from the dining-room. She felt that she must speak to Patricia.
As a rule pupils were, of course, permitted to dress as they chose, but it seemed as if Patricia was actually trying to see how strange a rig she could wear and yet go unreproved.
On this day, she had done the oddest thing of all. She had tied her hair on the crown of her head with a yellow ribbon. The ribbon was very wide, and the bow was enormous. As if that were not enough she had taken equally wide ribbon, of pink, and of blue, had tied a large bow of each and then had pinned the pink bow to the right loop of the yellow bow, the blue bow to the left loop, and when she entered the dining-room the effect was, to say the least, _amazing_!
The bows were about eight inches wide. Really, Patricia was a droll sight!
Unless she were spoken to she would wear her freakish ribbons at the afternoon session.
When lunch was over, and the pupils came trooping out into the hall, Miss Fenler spoke to Patricia. When they at last stood alone in one corner of the hall, Miss Fenler mentioned the gaudy colors, and said that while the girls were permitted to wear as bright ribbons as they chose, they would certainly not be allowed to wear three huge bows at a time.
"The idea!" said Patricia. "Well, I guess I"ll not agree to wear little stingy-looking bows for any one."
"You would obstruct the view of the large blackboard," said Miss Fenler.
"No one could see around your head."
"I shall wear these bows I have on or none at all!" said Patricia.
"Don"t be obstinate," said Miss Fenler. "Mrs. Marvin told me to speak to you."
"Did _she_ say I couldn"t wear these big bows?" Patricia asked, her eyes black with anger.
"She certainly did," declared Miss Fenler.
"Well, you can tell her I wear these or none at all," Patricia said, stoutly.
"None at all!" repeated Miss Fenler.
"Don"t attempt to come into the cla.s.s-room with your long hair untidy.
Without a ribbon it would look slovenly."
Patricia"s smile was broad, and her eyes actually impish as she left the hall.
"She"s equal to pinning on a half-dozen extra bows if she chooses," Miss Fenler said, under her breath.
Glenmore, once a private estate, looked like an old castle, and the dwellings that were its nearest neighbors were owned by old and wealthy residents. No stores had ever broken the charm of the locality, and the sleepy old town had supposed that they never would, yet around the corner of a little back street, an enterprising Italian had purchased a wee cottage. After three days a sign appeared in his front window. It stunned the residents. It read:
ANTONIO CARANA, BARBER AND HAIRDRESSER.
Already small boys and girls might be seen, in charge of maids, trotting up his steps with long curls, and after a few minutes, appearing with a "Dutch cut."
Patricia, b.u.t.toning her coat as she ran, appeared at his door breathless, but eager.
"I want my hair bobbed, and I must have it done right off, or I"ll be late to school," she cried, rushing past the astonished Tony, and mounting his big chair.
"_Dutch cut!_" she demanded, thinking that he had not understood her.
"Cutta da long hair?" he asked, lifting the strands.
"Sure," cried Patricia, "What else would I want cut off? Certainly not my _nose_."
"Alla right," said Tony, but he thought it strange, and wondered if the little girl"s mother would appear at any moment, angry, and vengeful.
Patricia"s temper had been gradually cooling, and now, as she saw the long locks that Tony had clipped, she was desperately sorry that she had come. It was half done, however, so she could not "back out." One does not care to appear with the right side of one"s head with short hair, and the left side with hair half-way toward one"s girdle!
Patricia sighed, and allowed him to continue. What else could she do?
She had been proud of her hair, but when she saw herself in the mirror, her vanity came to her aid.