CHAPTER XVI
A DISGRUNTLED REFORMER
Grace was not disappointed. Miss Duncan graciously agreed to let theculprit off with a severe reprimand. Grace ran joyfully down the campusto Holland House. She wished to tell Mabel Ashe the good news.
"Horrid little copy-cat! She doesn't deserve it," was Mabel'sunsympathetic comment as Grace related what had passed between MissDuncan and herself. "You know who she is, don't you, Grace?"
Grace shook her head. "I haven't the slightest idea," she said soberly."I can't believe it was any one at Wayne Hall. You don't suspect anyone, do you?"
"No," returned Mabel. "I haven't become very well acquainted with thefreshmen this year, so far. I suppose you did right in not exposing thisgirl. I don't know whether I should be quite as charitable as you. Ifyou hadn't had a witness who saw you write the theme, you would now beunder a cloud. What I can't forget is the fact that she went so far asto try to make Miss Duncan believe that you really copied it. MissDuncan said she insisted that the theme had disappeared from her room.Think how foolish she must have felt when Miss Duncan confronted herwith the truth yesterday afternoon and made her confess!"
"Oh, Mabel!" Grace's distressed tone caused the pretty senior to riseand stand in front of Grace's chair.
"What's the matter, Gracie," she said, taking Grace's hands in hers.
Grace raised her gray eyes to meet the inquiring brown ones bent on her."I'm so sorry," she said sadly, "but the girl who took my theme doeslive in Wayne Hall."
"How do you know?" asked Mabel quickly.
"From what you said," returned Grace. "If she accused me of taking hertheme from her room, isn't it highly probable that her room is in WayneHall? I wouldn't be likely to go into one of the campus houses to steala theme, would I? I must have dropped it in the hall or on the stairsthat night, and she must have come into the house directly after I didand picked it up. I don't like to believe that one of our girls did it,"Grace concluded sorrowfully, "but I am afraid it's true."
"Some day you'll stumble upon the guilty girl when you least expect tofind her," prophesied Mabel. "Now forget her, and tell me what you andyour chums are going to do over Thanksgiving. I am going to a dance onThanksgiving night with a Willston man. His fraternity is giving it."
"I don't know any college men in this part of the world," sighed Graceregretfully, "therefore I never have any invitations to man dances."
"Wait until my cousin comes up here. He is a Columbia man and you willlike him immensely. I know a number of the Willston men, too. Why don'tyou go with me to the football game Thanksgiving Day? You are not goingaway, are you? It is only a four days' vacation, you know."
"No, we haven't any particular place to go. Last year we spent ourThanksgiving vacation with the Southards in New York. You knew aboutthat."
"You lucky things," laughed Mabel. "I envy you your friendship withEverett Southard and his sister."
"Some day you must meet them," planned Grace. "They are delightfulpeople. Mr. Southard is appearing in Shakespearian roles in the largecities this season, and Miss Southard is in Florida visiting friends. Ifthey were in New York they would insist on our going to them for theholidays. I must run away now. It is almost dinner time and I promisedto hook up Elfreda's new gown. Miriam went over to Morton House withGertrude Wells, and won't return until late, and Elfreda is going todine with the Anarchist."
"Really!" exclaimed Mabel. "Elfreda seems to be coming to the front thisyear, doesn't she!"
"She is turning out splendidly," said Grace warmly. "She stands high inevery one of her classes, and she is so ridiculously funny that we wouldfeel lost without her. She says things in the same droll way that ayoung man we know in Oakdale does. But I mustn't stay another minute.Good-bye, Mabel, I'll see you in a day or two."
Grace darted across the campus and ran rapidly in the direction of WayneHall. She loved to run and her fleetness of foot had served her well onmore than one occasion. Only that day she had complained to Miriam thatit had been years since she had indulged in a good run. Miriam hadlaughingly accused her of still being a tomboy, and had proposed thatthey take a long tramp on Saturday. "You can run up and down the road toyour heart's content when we get far enough away from Overton so that noone will see you and think you have suddenly gone crazy," Miriam haddeclared good-naturedly.
Bounding up the steps two at a time, Grace reached the front door ofWayne Hall without drawing a laboring breath. "I'm certainly in goodcondition," she laughed to herself, inhaling deeply and inflating herchest. "I hope I'll be chosen to play on the team this year." She rang athird time before the door was opened by Emma Dean, who grumbled at herrepeated ringing and then announced that she had rung six times thatafternoon before any one had condescended to let her in. "Have you seenElfreda?" flung back Grace on her way upstairs.
"You'd better hurry," called Emma after her. "I heard her growling toherself as I passed her door."
"I began to think you were never coming," greeted Elfreda, as Graceburst into the room, her eyes bright and her cheeks becomingly flushedfrom her recent run across the campus.
"Why didn't you ask some one else to hook you up?" retorted Gracemischievously, throwing down her gloves and beginning on the top hook.
"Because I wanted you to see how nice I looked in this new frock,"replied the stout girl. "If I had not stipulated that you were toperform this extremely important service for me, you would have in allprobability absented yourself from my immediate vicinity, unmindful ofthe rare exhibition of youth and beauty that was being prepared for youin my room."
"If I had closed my eyes I could have sworn it was Miss Atkins," laughedGrace. "Even she herself couldn't fail to recognize that impersonation.It's ridiculously funny, Elfreda, but I wish you wouldn't do it." AsGrace and Elfreda were standing with their backs directly away from thedoor neither girl saw the tense little figure that stood rigid, one handon the door casing, listening with eyebrows drawn fiercely together. Aninstant later it had vanished. Grace, after triumphantly placing thelast hook in its eye, began helping Elfreda find her handkerchief andgloves. "Now you have everything you need," she declared, holding up thestout girl's coat. "Do you wait here for your dinner partner or does shecall for you?"
"She is coming in here for me," answered Elfreda. "I wish she wouldhurry along. I haven't had even a cracker to eat since luncheon and I'mfamished."
"I think I'll go if you don't mind. I'm hungry, too. I must see if Annehas come in yet. Miss Atkins will be here in a moment. Good-bye. I hopeyou will have a nice time. I am so glad she invited you."
Grace crossed the hall to her own room. Anne was rearranging her hairpreparatory to going down to dinner.
"I think I'll do my hair over again," decided Grace. "That run acrossthe campus shook most of my hairpins loose. It will be at least tenminutes before the bell rings, so I shall have plenty of time." But herhair proved refractory and the clang of the dinner bell found hertucking in a last unruly lock. "I'm going on downstairs, Grace," calledAnne from the doorway.
"All right," answered Grace. As she passed Elfreda's room she heard hername uttered in a sibilant whisper. Wheeling at the sound, Grace steppedto the stout girl's door. Elfreda drew her in and, closing the door,said nervously: "What do you suppose has happened? I waited and waitedfor the An--Miss Atkins and she didn't appear, so I went down to herroom and found the door closed. I knocked at least a dozen times, untilmy knuckles ached, but not a sound came from within. Then I came back tomy room and waited. She hasn't materialized yet. I went down to her doorjust now and knocked again, but, nothing doing." In her agitationElfreda dropped into slang.
"That is strange," agreed Grace. "Do you suppose she has been takensuddenly ill?"
"Search me," declared Elfreda wearily. "She ought to be called theRiddle. She is past solution, isn't she? I'm hungry, and if she doesn'tappear within the next five minutes I'm going to put on my old brownserge dress and go down to dinner. I'm not used to being invited out todine and then desert
ed before I've even had a chance to look at the billof fare."
"Never mind," comforted Grace. "I'll ask you to dinner at Martell's nextweek and won't desert you either. Wait a minute. I will go down to thedining room and see if by any chance she could be there. Then I'll comeupstairs and let you know. If she isn't there you had better change yourgown and go downstairs with me."
"She isn't there," reported Grace, five minutes later. "Miss Taylor is,but her roommate is missing."
"'Parted at the altar,'" quoted Elfreda dramatically. "Will you pleaseunhook me?"
For the second time that night Grace busied herself with the troublesomehooks and eyes. Elfreda jerked off the new gown. Her temper was rising."This is what comes of cultivating freaks," she muttered, lapsing intoher old rudeness. "I might have known she'd do something. Catch me onany more reform committees!"
"The way of the reformer is hard," soothed Grace, as she picked up thegown Elfreda had thrown in a heap on the floor, and folding it, laid itacross the foot of the stout girl's couch.
Elfreda, who was reaching into the closet for her brown serge dress,wheeled about, regarding Grace solemnly. "Too hard for me," shedeclared. "Hereafter, the Anarchist can attend to her own reformation.The Briggs Helping Hand Society has disbanded."