"Oh, gracious!" exclaimed Rose. "Now, are you going to be good,-- you two? If you are, just break the news at once, and have it over.
I can bear it." She fanned herself in such a comical way that no one could help laughing. Mary Silver joined, but stopped pretty soon in her sudden manner.
"There"s Mary, now," went on Rose: "she"s a Paragon. But, if any more are coming into the entry, just give me fair notice, and I pack and move up among the sinners in Attic Row. Somehow, you don"t look like Paragons either,--you especially," nodding to Clover. "Your eyes are like violets; but so are Sylvia"s--that"s my sister,--and she"s the greatest witch in Ma.s.sachusetts. Eyes are dreadfully deceitful things.
As for you,"--to Katy,--"you"re so tall that I can"t take you in all at once; but the piece I see doesn"t look dreadful a bit."
Rose was sitting in the window as she made these remarks; and, leaning forward suddenly, she gave a pretty, blushing nod to some one below.
Katy glanced down, and saw a handsome young man replacing the cap he had lifted from his head.
"That"s Berry Searles," said Rose. "He"s the president"s son, you know. He always comes through the side yard to get to his room.
That"s it,--the one with the red curtain. It"s exactly opposite your window: don"t you see?"
"So it is!" exclaimed Katy, remembering what Lilly had said. "Oh!
was that the reason?"--she stopped, afraid of being rude.
"The reason we wanted the room?" inquired Rose, coolly. "Well, I don"t know. It hadn"t occurred to me to look at it in that light.
Mary!" with sudden severity, "is it possible that you had Berry Searles in your mind when you were so pertinacious about that room?"
"Rose! How can you? You know I never thought of such a thing,"
protested poor Mary.
"I hope not; otherwise I should feel it my duty to consult with Mrs.
Florence on the subject," went on Rose, with an air of dignified admonition. "I consider myself responsible for you and your morals, Mary. Let us change this painful subject." She looked gravely at the three girls for a moment; then her lips began to twitch, the irresistible dimples appeared in her cheeks, and, throwing herself back in her chair, she burst into a fit of laughter.
"O Mary, you blessed goose! Some day or other you"ll be the death of me! Dear, dear! how I am behaving! It"s perfectly horrid of me. And I didn"t mean it. I"m going to be real good this term; I promised mother. Please forget it, and don"t take a dislike to me, and never come again," she added, coaxingly, as Katy and Clover rose to go.
"Indeed we won"t," replied Katy. As for sensible Clover, she was already desperately in love with Rose, on that very first day!
After a couple of hours of hard work, No. 6 was in order, and looked like a different place. Fringed towels were laid over the wash-stand and the table. Dr. Carr"s photograph and some pretty chromos ornamented the walls; the rocking-chair and the study-chair stood by the window; the trunks were hidden by chintz covers, made for the purpose by old Mary. On the window-sill stood Cousin Helen"s vase, which Katy had brought carefully packed among her clothes.
"Now," she said, tying the blinds together with a knot of ribbon in imitation of Rose Red"s, "when we get a bunch of wild flowers for my vase, we shall be all right."
A tap at the door. Rose entered.
"Are you done?" she asked; "may I come in and see?"
"Oh, this is pretty!" she exclaimed, looking about: "how you can tell in one minute what sort of a girl one is, just by looking at her room!
I should know you had been neat and dainty and housekeepery all your days. And you would see in a minute that I"m a Madge Wildfire, and that Ellen Gray is a saint, and Sally Satterlee a scatterbrain, and Lilly Page an affected little hum-- oh, I forgot, she is your cousin, isn"t she? How dreadfully rude of me!" dimpling at Clover, who couldn"t help dimpling back again.
"Oh, my!" she went on, "a wash-stand, I declare! Where did you get it?"
"Papa bought it," explained Katy: "he asked Mrs. Florence"s permission."
"How bright of him! I shall just write to my father to ask for permission too." Which she did; and the result was that it set the fashion of wash-stands, and so many papas wrote to "ask permission,"
that Mrs. Florence found it necessary to give up the lavatory system, and provide wash-stands for the whole house. Katy"s request had been the opening wedge. I do not think this fact made her more popular with the princ.i.p.als.
"By the way, where is Lilly?" asked Katy; "I haven"t seen her to-day."
"Do you want to know? I can tell you. She"s sitting on the edge of one chair, with her feet on the rung of another chair, and her head on the shoulder of her room-mate (who is dying to get away and arrange her drawers); and she"s crying"--
"How do you know? Have you been up to see her?"
"Oh! I haven"t seen her. It isn"t necessary. I saw her last term, and the term before. She always spends the first day at school in that way. I"ll take you up, if you"d like to examine for yourselves."
Katy and Clover, much amused, followed as she led the way upstairs.
Sure enough, Lilly was sitting exactly as Rose had predicted. Her face was swollen from crying. When she saw the girls, her sobs redoubled.
"Oh! isn"t it dreadful?" she demanded. "I shall die, I know I shall.
Oh! why did pa make me come?"
"Now, Lilly, don"t be an idiot," said the unsympathizing Rose. Then she sat down and proceeded to make a series of the most grotesque faces, winking her eyes and twinkling her fingers round the head of "Niobe," as she called Lilly, till the other girls were in fits of laughter, and Niobe, though she shrugged her shoulders pettishly and said, "Don"t be so ridiculous, Rose Red," was forced to give way.
First she smiled, then a laugh was heard; afterward she announced that she felt better.
"That"s right, Niobe," said Rose. "Wash your face now, and get ready for tea, for the bell is just going to ring. As for you, Annie, you might as well put your drawers in order," with a wicked wink. Annie hurried away with a laugh, which she tried in vain to hide.
"You heartless creature!" cried the exasperated Lilly. "I believe you"re made of marble; you haven"t one bit of feeling. Nor you either, Katy. You haven"t cried a drop."
"Given this problem," said the provoking Rose: "when the nose without is as red as a lobster, what must be the temperature of the heart within, and _vice versa?_"
The tea-bell rang just in time to avert a fresh flood of tears from Lilly. She brushed her hair in angry haste, and they all hurried down by a side staircase which, as Rose explained, the school-girls were expected to use. The dining-room was not large; only part of the girls could be seated at a time; so they took turns at dining at the first table, half one week and half the next.
Mrs. Nipson sat at the tea-tray, with Mrs. Florence beside her. At the other end of the long board sat a severe-looking person, whom Lilly announced in a whisper as "that horrid Miss Jane." The meal was very simple,--tea, bread and b.u.t.ter, and dried beef:--it was eaten in silence; the girls were not allowed to speak, except to ask for what they wanted. Rose Red indeed, who sat next to Mrs.
Florence, talked to her, and even ventured once or twice on daring little jokes, which caused Clover to regard her with admiring astonishment. No one else said any thing, except "b.u.t.ter, please,"
or "Pa.s.s the bread." As they filed upstairs after this cheerless meal, they were met by rows of hungry girls, who were waiting to go down, and who whispered, "How long you have been! What"s for tea?"
The evening pa.s.sed in making up cla.s.ses and arranging for recitation- rooms and study-hours. Katy was glad when bed-time came. The day, with all its new impressions and strange faces, seemed to her like a confused dream. She and Clover undressed very quietly. Among the printed rules, which hung on the bedroom door, they read: "All communication between room-mates, after the retiring bell has rung, is strictly prohibited." Just then it did not seem difficult to keep this rule. It was only after the candle was blown out, that Clover ventured to whisper,--very low indeed, for who knew but Miss Jane was listening outside the door?--"Do you think you"re going to like it?" and Katy, in the same cautious whisper, responded, "I"m not quite sure." And so ended the first day at the nunnery.
CHAPTER V. ROSES AND THORNS.
"Oh! what is it? What has happened?" cried Clover, starting up in bed, the next morning, as a clanging sound roused her suddenly from sleep. It was only the rising-bell, ringing at the end of Quaker Row.
Katy held her watch up to the dim light. She could just see the hands.
Yes: they pointed to six. It was actually morning! She and Clover jumped up, and began to dress as fast as possible.
"We"ve only got half an hour," said Clover, unhooking the rules, and carrying them to the window,--"Half an hour; and this says that we must turn the mattress, smooth the under-sheet over the bolster, and spend five minutes in silent devotion! We"ll have to be quick to do all that besides dressing ourselves!"
It is never easy to be quick, when one is in a hurry. Every thing sets itself against you. Fingers turn into thumbs; dresses won"t b.u.t.ton, nor pins keep their place. With all their haste, Katy and Clover were barely ready when the second bell sounded. As they hastened downstairs, Katy fastening her breast-pin, and Clover her cuffs, they met other girls, some looking half asleep, some half dressed; all yawning, rubbing their eyes, and complaining of the early hour.
"Isn"t it horrid?" said Lilly Page, hurrying by with no collar on, and her hair hastily tucked into a net. "I never get up till nine o"clock when I"m at home. Ma saves my breakfast for me. She says I shall have my sleep out while I have the chance."
"You don"t look quite awake now," remarked Clover.
"No, because I haven"t washed my face. Half the time I don"t, before breakfast. There"s that old mattress has to be turned; and, when I sleep over, I just do that first, and then scramble my clothes on the best way I can. Any thing not to be marked!"
After prayers and breakfast were done, the girls had half an hour for putting their bedrooms to rights, during which interval it is to be hoped that Lilly found time to wash her face. After that, lessons began, and lasted till one o"clock. Dinner followed, with an hour"s "recreation;" then the bell rang for "silent study hour," when the girls sat with their books in their bedrooms, but were not allowed to speak to each other. Next came a walk.