Grace Harlowe's Junior Year at High School

  CHAPTER XXI

  BREAKERS AHEAD

  The dress rehearsal for "As You Like It" was over. It had been well nighperfect. The costumes had for the most part been on hand, as the seniorclass of five years previous had given the same play and bequeathedtheir paraphernalia to those who should come after. Rosalind's costumeshad to be altered to fit Anne, however, on account of her lack ofstature. Also the lines in the text where Rosalind refers to her heightunderwent some changes. The final details having been attended to, MissTebbs and Miss Kane found time to congratulate each other on thesmoothness of the production, which bade fair to surpass anything of thekind ever before given. There was not a weak spot in the cast. Anne'swork had seemed to grow finer with every rehearsal.

  She had won the repeated applause of the group of teachers who had beeninvited to witness this trial performance. Grace, Nora, Eleanor andMiriam had ably supported her and there had been tears of proud joy inMiss Tebbs's eyes as she had watched the clever and spirited acting ofthese girls.

  "Be sure and put your costumes exactly where they belong," called MissTebbs as the girls filed off the stage into the dressing room after thefinal curtain. "Then you will have no trouble to-morrow night. We wantto avoid all eleventh-hour scrambling and exciting costume hunts."

  Laughing merrily, the girls began choosing places to hang their costumesin the big room off the stage where they were to dress. Anne, carefullittle soul that she was, piled her paraphernalia neatly in one corner,and taking a slip of paper from her bag wrote "Rosalind" upon it,pinning it to her first-act costume.

  "The eternal labeler," said Nora, with her ever-ready giggle, as shewatched Anne. "Are you afraid it will run away, little Miss Fussbudget!"

  "No; of course not," said Anne, smiling. "I just marked it because----"

  "You have the marking habit," finished Jessica. "Come on, girls. Don'ttease Anne. Let her put tags on herself if she wants to. Then a certainyoung man who is waiting outside for her will be sure to recognize her.Has anyone seen that Allison child? It's time she put in an appearance."

  "Just listen to Grandmother Bright," teased Anne. "She is hunting herlost chick, as usual."

  With merry laugh and jest the girls prepared for the street. Grace andher friends were among the first to leave, and hurried to the street,where the boys awaited them.

  "Hurrah for the only original ranters and barnstormers on exhibition inthis country," cried Hippy, waving his hat in the air.

  "Cease, Hippopotamus," said Nora. "You are mistaken. We are stars, butwe shall refuse to twinkle in your sky unless you suddenly become morerespectful."

  "He doesn't know the definition of the word," said David.

  "How cruelly you misjudge me," said Hippy. "I meant no disrespect. Itwas a sudden attack of enthusiasm. I get them spasmodically."

  "So we have observed," said Nora dryly. "Let's not stand here discussingyou all night. Come on up to my house, and we'll make fudge and havethings to eat."

  "I have my car here," said David. "Pile into it and we'll be up there ina jiffy."

  "It's awfully late," demurred Grace. "After ten o'clock."

  "Never mind that," said Nora. "Your mother knows you can take care ofyourself. You can 'phone to her from my house."

  In another minute the young people had seated themselves in the big carand were off.

  "Did you see Eleanor's runabout standing there?" Nora asked Grace.

  "Yes," replied Grace. "I was rather surprised, too. She hasn't used itmuch of late."

  "How beautiful she looked to-night, didn't she?" interposed Jessica.

  "Are you talking of the would-be murderess, who froze us all outThanksgiving Day?" asked Hippy. "What is her latest crime?"

  Grace felt like saying "Destroying other people's property and gettinginnocent folks disliked," but refrained. She had told no one of herinterview with Miss Thompson. Grace knew that the principal was stilldispleased with her. She was no longer on the old terms of intimacy withMiss Thompson. A barrier seemed to have sprung up between them, thatonly one thing could remove, but Grace was resolved not to exposeEleanor--not that she felt that Eleanor did not richly deserve it, butshe knew that it would mean instant expulsion from school. She believedthat Eleanor had acted on the impulse of the moment, and was withoutdoubt bitterly sorry for it, and she felt that as long as Eleanor had atlast begun to be interested in school, the thing to do was to keep herthere, particularly as Mrs. Gray had recently told her of Miss Nevin'spleasure at the change that the school had apparently wrought inEleanor.

  Could Grace have known what Eleanor was engaged in at the moment shewould have felt like exposing her without mercy.

  During the first rehearsals Grace, secretly fearing an outbreak onEleanor's part, had been on the alert, but as rehearsals progressed andEleanor kept strictly to herself, Grace relaxed her vigilance.

  Directly after the chums had hurried out of the hall to meet the boys,Miss Tebbs had decided that opening the dressing room on the other sideof the stage would relieve the congestion and insure a better chance forall to dress. Calling to the girls who still remained to move theirbelongings to that side, Miss Tebbs hurried across the stage to find thejanitor and see that the door was at once unlocked. By the time the doorwas opened and the lights turned on the remaining girls flocked in,their arms piled high with costumes.

  Foremost among them was Eleanor. Hastily depositing her own costumes inone corner of the dressing room, she darted across the stage and intothe room from which she had just moved her effects.

  It was empty. She glanced quickly about. Like a flash she gathered up apile of costumes marked "Rosalind," covered them with her long fur coatand ran through the hall and down the steps to where her runabout wasstationed. Crowding them hastily into the bottom of the machine, sheslipped on her coat, made ready her runabout and drove down the streetlike the wind, not lessening her speed until she reached the drive at"Heartsease."

  * * * * *

  The young people passed a merry hour at Nora's, indulging in one oftheir old-time frolics, that only lacked Tom Gray's presence to make theoriginal octette complete.

  "We'll be in the front row to-morrow night," said Hippy, as the youngfolks trooped out to the car. "I have engaged a beautiful bunch of greenonions from the truck florist, Reddy has put all his money into carrotsof a nice lively color, the exact shade of his hair, while I haveadvised Davy here to invest in turnips. They are nice and round andhard, and will hit the stage with a resounding whack, providing he canthrow straight enough to hit anything. He can carry them in a paper bagand----"

  But before he could say more he was seized by David and Reddy and rushedunceremoniously into the street, while the girls signified theirapprobation by cries of "good enough for him" and "make him promise tobehave to-morrow night."

  "I will. I swear it," panted Hippy. "Only don't rush me over the groundso fast. I might lose my breath and never, never catch it again."

  "Oh, let him go," said Nora, who had accompanied them down the walk."I'll have a private interview with him to-morrow and that will insurehis good behavior."

  "Thank you, angel Nora," replied Hippy gratefully. "You will be sparedany obnoxious vegetables, even though the others may suffer."

  "For that you walk," said David, who had dropped Hippy and was engagedin helping the girls into the machine.

  "Never," replied Hippy, making a dive for the automobile. "I shall sitat the feet of the fair Jessica. Reddy will be so pleased."

  "Every one ready?" sang out David, as he took his place at the wheelafter cranking up the machine.

  "All ready, let her go," was the chorus, and the machine whizzed downthe street.