"I will give you a room where you _may_ have a companion if you like.
Some girls get homesick at first if they are alone."
"Oh, I shall not be homesick," she exclaimed with gay a.s.surance.
Up the broad staircase they trooped, though there were two smaller ones convenient to many of the rooms. There was a long corridor with small rooms opening on the one side, and a cross hall leading to those in front. In the double rooms were screens arranged to insure as much privacy as one cared for. A white bed, a sort of closet with book-shelves above, a bureau and dressing table, a wardrobe built in the wall, a wicker arm chair and a rocking chair, with a large ha.s.sock and a small one.
"Now," said Mrs. Aldred, "when your trunk comes you will empty it and put your clothes away, and the servant will take it to the trunk room."
It came up in a few moments. Then Mrs. Aldred left her with some kindly wishes.
Helen went to the window. It overlooked the southwest. There were tops of trees, then a depression that was the river, and over beyond fields golden in the sunshine,--that was the stubble of grain, others a dull brown with here and there a bit of green weed pushing up st.u.r.dily since the hay had been cut, young winter wheat over beyond, houses, farms, rising ground again and woodlands. Far over to the westward were the grand hills of another State. It was so much more beautiful than all the Hopes with their levels.
This wonderful thing had happened to her. Hardly a year, indeed it was at the beginning of the present year that Mr. Warfield had gone at her rather fiercely, she thought, and told her there was no use of dawdling and that she must pa.s.s for the High School.
"But I can"t go to the High School," she had protested. That looked impossible.
"No matter, you can pa.s.s," he had said so sternly that she wondered why people must be cross when they were so much nicer in a pleasant mood.
Then Aunt Jane began to talk of next year when she should be through school. She roused suddenly, she "took hold" as people say and found that life meant something. Perhaps it was the growth out of childhood, the development of mind; country children were not a.n.a.lytical. She began to wonder about things, to ask questions that pleased Mr. Warfield and tormented Aunt Jane, and all these events, more than had come in the thirteen and a half years before, had happened in this little s.p.a.ce of time. Eight months only.
"Oh dear, I wonder if things, incidents, come this way to all girls. I wonder if there is a time when you wake up," and she looked steadily at the sky with its drifts of gray white clouds as if it could answer.
"Well, I do suppose Jenny woke up, too. She wanted to go in the shop and earn money. Sam doesn"t seem very wide awake, though he means to learn a trade. Yes, I think there must be diverse gifts. Oh, it"s just glorious here! I wish Mrs. Van Dorn could know."
She did know one day before she sailed and her heart thrilled with a warmth it had not known in a long while. Clara was serene, useful, patient, but she _did_ lack enthusiasm.
There were steps and voices, gay laughs, some new girls had come, some old ones rushed out to welcome them. Helen turned and saw her trunks and began to devote herself to unpacking. There was a best hat in a compartment. She opened the wardrobe door and on the shelf were two hat boxes. That was settled. The small articles she laid on the rug, and lifted out the tray. Then came the gowns and skirts, the shirtwaists and all the paraphernalia. She found places for them. But here were two very precious belongings, the Madonna she had once coveted, and a tall vase of roses with a few fallen leaves so natural that one felt inclined to brush them off. There was also an extremely fine photograph of Mrs. Van Dorn. Of course the artist had done his best and turned back the hand of time; she was not over fifty that day.
Helen was much interested in "settling." There were hooks for her pictures, so she stood up on a chair and hung them. There were several pretty table ornaments, her writing desk with its outfit.
Some one tapped at the partly-opened door. She found a bright rosy-cheeked girl with a fluff of golden red hair, and a laughing face.
"You are one of the new girls," exclaimed a merry voice. "I"m Roxy Mays, not half as hard as my name sounds. In full its Roxalana. I"ve tried several other ways of shortening it, but they are delusions and snares.
I was named after a rich old great-aunt, she was my sponsor and consented to promise I should renounce everything desirable. Why is it that rich people have such ugly names and are always wanting to perpetuate them, or do you get rich on an ugly name? There ought to be some compensation. Now--have you any objection to stating yours before supper time?"
"Mine is Helen Grant."
"Oh, that is splendid and strong and easy to call. There was Helen Mar, and Helen of Troy, and several other famous Helens. Well, I like your name to begin with. Are you going to be a doctor?"
"A doctor!" Helen gave a little shudder.
"Oh, that settles it. You haven"t the courage for all you look so brave.
Two of our last year"s graduates have chosen that walk in life. One goes to New York bound to work her way through, the other to Wellesley. Seven years of study, think of it and weep!"
"But if she loves to study?"
"Depravity of taste. Spider, ask in this timid fly hovering about your gates," and as Helen stepped back with a gesture of the hand Miss Mays entered and glanced around, though she kept on talking. "Do you like getting settled, and are you not bothered about the right places?--oh,"
with almost a shriek--"you have that lovely Bodenhausen Madonna! I have the Sichel and I never can decide which I like best. And then Gabriel Marx, and Dangerfield! We"re not hopelessly modern, for I have the Sistine. Nearly every girl has it. And oh, who is this handsome woman? A d.u.c.h.ess at the very least!"
"That is--a dear friend," Helen flushed. "That must have been taken when she was younger. She is quite old now."
"Elderly. There may be old men and old peasant women in pictures, but the living women are simply elderly. Well, one wouldn"t mind growing old if one could look like that. Have you ever been away at school before?"
"No," returned Helen.
"North, South, East or West? Brevity is the soul of wit. I sometimes set up for a wit when I can do it on a small capital."
"Rather southerly from here," laughed Helen. "A little country place called Hope Center."
"Hope Center. Helen Grant. Well that has a sound! You will do. What else are you going to put up?"
"I haven"t anything else."
"That"s delightful. Most girls bring so much from home, to cry over. You don"t really look like the crying kind. And school girl treasures acc.u.mulate fearfully. It"s nice to have a place to put the new ones."
She had a small photograph of Mrs. Dayton in her writing desk. There had not been any keepsakes to bring.
"Won"t you come and be introduced to some of the girls? They are in Daisy Bell"s room."
"Wouldn"t I----" she hesitated.
"Be an intruder? Oh dear no. The sooner you get over these things the better. Come!"
She took Helen"s hand and led her to a room two or three doors down. The screens had been pushed aside. On one bed sat two girls, two others were hanging pictures and spreading bric-a-brac on brackets and shelves. One of the girls was still in short skirts, and Helen felt secretly glad.
This was Daisy Bell.
"Oh, thank goodness you"re not grown up," cried Daisy, eyeing her from head to toe. "I wept, I prayed, I entreated for long skirts, and I couldn"t move my mother, any more than the rock of Gibraltar."
"Well, you"re not a senior. Why should you care?"
"How old are you, Miss Grant?"
"Past fourteen the last of June."
"Oh, how tall for that! I"m fifteen. But I have two older sisters, and they are always saying "That child, Daisy," as if I was about seven. How many sisters have you?"
"None. And no father or mother."
"You poor wretched orphan!"
[Ill.u.s.tration: Helen"s first day at Aldred House.--_Page 192._]
"She doesn"t look a bit wretched, Roxy Mays," said a girl who had been surveying her. "The juniors are all down there," nodding toward the lower end of the hall, "so you might have known she wasn"t "sweet and twenty.""
"At what age do you begin to grow sweet so as to get ready for the twenty?"
"Oh, girls, don"t let"s hurry into the twenty. I"d like to stay sixteen three years, and seventeen four years."
"I wish they"d made the years longer. There could have been another month or two put in vacation time."