"How can we help it if our parents and chaperones do it without our knowledge," queried Eleanor, innocently.
"Well, I"ll speak to them, then. Ken and I will have to be off again next week; so for the few days we have at home we want you girls to pa.s.s up all other fun. You"ve got all the year for other beaux, you know,"
grumbled Jim.
Polly and Eleanor laughed. "Oh, yes," said the latter, "we just keep on the go continually, every afternoon and evening, with a devoted swain each day to replace the ones of the day before."
"Where do you meet them?" demanded Jim, jealously.
"We-ll-the first one Polly and I snared, we "picked up" at an art sale.
But we have many opportunities to meet others, you know."
"Yes," added Polly, entering the joke, "at night school, you know, there are loads of young men; and at lectures and exhibitions-and everywhere."
"Is that why you both are so crazy to go to these dry lecture affairs?"
jeered Kenneth, thinking himself very clever, indeed.
But they failed to get the girls to break the engagement with the Ashbys, and Jim barely managed, through his father"s kind auspices, to meet Mr. Dalken Sat.u.r.day morning, and thus open the way to call on the Ashbys that evening.
Mr. Dalken was young in spirit if not in years, and he enjoyed helping the two boys work out the little plot so as to be present with Polly and Eleanor at the Ashbys, that evening. But the boys never knew that their benefactor pa.s.sed up an exciting game of chess at his club, that Sat.u.r.day night, in order to introduce them to his friends.
There were so many wonderful things to do during that Holiday Week, that the girls could not attend them all. Many of their school-friends were eager to have them at teas and parties and matinees, but all these had to be refused with regrets. Eleanor remarked: "Wait for school to open.
We"ll be the most popular girls there. In fact, every last girl will want to f.a.g for us!"
"Why?" asked Polly, wonderingly.
"Because they think we are in such demand, everywhere, that we can"t accept any invitations of theirs. Don"t you suppose they have told each other? Lots of those girls travel around together, and they talk everything over. But I guess they are wondering who takes us out so much, and what society we travel in." Eleanor laughed.
Polly looked at her with pity. "Nolla, sometimes I feel _so_ sorry for you! All your joy and pleasure in having others act nice or kind to you, is lost because of the education you"ve had in Bob"s school. Now I don"t believe those girls ask us just to cater to us because we are popular. I think they really like us and would love to have us with them. If I wasn"t so frightfully busy with school at night, and other worth-while occupations, I"d jaunt about with them."
Eleanor said nothing more, but she did a lot of thinking.
CHAPTER IX-POLLY"S MUSCLE
Mr. Maynard was delighted with Eleanor"s evident improvement in health, and all fears of the New York climate vanished entirely, before he finished his visit in New York. He remained a week and then said good-by, reminding Mrs. Stewart that she had invited him for the Christmas Holidays. They all laughed because he was welcome, at all times, to remain as long as he could.
Regular studies began again after the Thanksgiving Holiday and, with the reopening of the cla.s.ses, the girls started in on a new line of art at Cooper Union. Anne Stewart used to escort the girls to and from the school on cla.s.s-nights, but it was such a tiresome trip for her to make, after a hard day at school, and with lessons to go over at home, that the girls insisted upon her staying home.
Mr. Fabian generally conducted them home after cla.s.s, and then went on to his own rooms. As it was hardly dark by seven-thirty, in October and early November, it was no more hazardous for the two girls to walk or ride down to the Square than it would be in the daytime.
But the days were becoming so much shorter after Thanksgiving, that it was quite dark by six o"clock. Hence Anne worried about their going downtown, alone, even though it was but a few blocks.
The second week of cla.s.s in December, found Mr. Fabian absent. He had taken a severe cold and thought better of risking his health in the bitter wind and Scotch mist that night.
Polly and Eleanor did not speak of it to Anne, as she, too, felt wretched that day; and they would rather have stayed at home than have had her accompany them to night school in her state of health.
"You"re not to worry about us, Anne, if we do not come in as early as usual," said Eleanor, upon opening the door to go out.
"Why-where will you be?" asked Anne, instantly.
"Exams. Some of the teachers are testing us in all the work we did this last term, and we have to write our answers. We may be a full hour later than usual; but we"ll come uptown, together, so there"s nothing to worry about," explained Polly.
Anne thought she meant Mr. Fabian by "we-all" but Polly meant several of the students who lived a few blocks north of the Square.
Both girls were well bundled up in heavy storm coats, m.u.f.flers, and close-fitting woollen caps pulled down over their ears. Besides their books and other materials, they had umbrellas to carry but it was too windy to open them.
The examination questions proved to be most interesting; and the answers required a great deal of careful thought, before describing the various types, methods and ideals of architecture and decoration.
Polly described at large such questions as: "Can you describe the different types that go to make up the Egyptian people?" or the question: "How does plant-life affect Egyptian ornament-sketch two such plants."
"What is a torus molding? Where is echinus molding used? Sketch the cyma recta."
When Polly found the questions: "Describe a scarabaeus," and "Why did ancient Egyptians prepare their dead as they did, and describe a mummy and the methods used for its preservation," she was elated, for she had made a particular study of these subjects at the Metropolitan Museum where the collection of Egyptian antiques is unsurpa.s.sed.
There were many other interesting questions, all of which Polly was eager to answer, but time was too limited for her to say all she wished to. For instance, she wanted to describe, at length, Greek art and the Greek nation that was characteristic for its own type of art and ornament.
She was anxious to tell what she knew about color and its importance in art. Of polychromy and what it was. In fact, she needed hours in which to speak fully of the difference between Greek, Egyptian and a.s.syrian art and ornament.
Eleanor on her part, wrote graphically of the difference between the Arabs and Persians, and how their modes and habits had a corresponding effect on art. She liked to describe the style of Romanesque art and how it governed all Eastern Europe at one time.
Eleanor leaned to the Moorish cla.s.sics and had a weakness for Turkish designs; she loved the warm coloring used by the Moors in their work, and the harsh bright colors employed by the Turks. She had no hesitation in selecting from samples shown, the Mohammedan designs, the Chinese, the Byzantine, or Arabian patterns. She was expert in stating why the fall of Rome affected all art in Eastern and Western Europe, and what was its highest development and its period of all architecture.
It was more than an hour later than usual, when the two girls put away their work and started out for home. The scholars who lived on streets uptown, had gone long before, and Polly and Eleanor found that the high wind made it impossible for them to open their umbrellas.
"It"s so icy we will have to use them as props," laughed Polly.
"My! But this sleet in one"s face is cold, isn"t it?" gasped Eleanor.
"Let"s take a short cut across the Plaza," suggested Polly, breaking into a run across the diamond that separates the streets at Third and Fourth avenues, and Eighth street.
Having reached the small oasis about the subway station, Eleanor said: "Why not take the subway, here, to Twenty-eighth street, Poll?"
"Oh, I hate those subways! This wonderful sleet and the quiet hissing of the ice on the windows and walks makes me feel as if I were home. No clatter of wheels, no shouting of burly men, no _nothing_ that makes a city so horrid. Let"s walk all the way home."
"All right," laughed Eleanor. "I"m game!"
So they started up Fourth avenue, past Wanamakers, and were soon lost to their surroundings in their discussion of the examinations.
"What answer did you give to the question "Tell the basis of religions existing with the Persians and the Arabs: describe the differences,"
Polly?"
"I was not quite sure of that, Nolla, but I did make a good thing of that question "Why did Egyptians use bright colors in art?" And also that question that read: "When colors of the pattern contrast with the colors of the back-ground, what general rule must govern?" You know, I just love to ferret out these ideas."
"So do I. But I never dreamed there was so much wonderful knowledge to be obtained in a course of this kind," said Eleanor, holding her arm before her face in order to speak distinctly.
They had now reached Eleventh street, and were pa.s.sing a saloon still brightly lighted, in spite of Prohibition Laws. In the doorway lounged three tough-looking young men; but the red-cheeked girls scarcely saw them-they were too interested in their conversation. An empty auto stood by the curb, but no other vehicle or person was in sight.