CHAPTER VII.
WHEN GHOST MEETS GHOST.
"Gee, but I'm hungry!" exclaimed Dum, as we trailed our sheeted forms upthe stairs. "Did you ever see such slim eats in all your life? Why, mycake was cut so thin and my ice cream was so scant, they could not havepassed muster even at a church fair!"
"Shh! Don't say a word, but I've got a box under my mattress. You letAnnie and Mary know, while I see Jean Rice and Nancy Blair. We'll meetin the Gym at eleven. I believe we will be safe from old Mr. Ryan. He issure to keep away from there as he knows that the skull lanterns arestill up. We had better not try to have the spread in our room as we areso close to teachers. Tell Mary and Annie to get their dummies ready andtell Dee to start on ours. I'll be up just as soon as I put Jean andNancy on."
Jean Rice and Nancy Blair were two girls we had been seeing a good dealof. They were full of fun and while they were rather a frivolous pair,they were nice and good tempered and always ready for a lark. You couldcount on them to join in on any hazardous expedition.
When eleven o'clock struck we were ready to repair to the Gym for oursecret repast. We kept on our sheets and masks as part of the fun. Wehad made our dummies ready and tucked them in their little downiesbefore we ventured forth. The corridors were dark and silent. The Gymwas at the far end of the building from us, down two flights of stairs.We judged it prudent to separate and go one by one a few seconds apartas, if we should by chance run against any one in authority, it waseasier for one to escape than five. I went first, the box of friedchicken clasped in my arms: Dum followed me with the beaten biscuit;then came Mary with ham sandwiches; and Annie close behind her,carefully hugging the caramel cake, too timid to let the space be toogreat between her and her friend. Dee valiantly brought up the rearwith stuffed eggs and pickles.
We found three girls instead of two waiting in the gymnasium. I thoughtJean and Nancy had brought a friend and went up to make her welcome.They had lighted some of the pumpkin and skull lanterns and werestanding with an air of expectancy.
"Hello, girls!" I whispered, "you beat us to it, didn't you? Which ofyou is which?"
"You tell us who you are first," demanded one of the figures, "and thenwe will tell you."
"I am Page Allison. I bet you are Nancy Blair."
There was a giggle from the masks. It was another bunch of Juniors onpleasure bent. They were waiting for five more girls and were going tohave a spread and a ghost dance.
It turned out that what one might call the cream of the Junior class wasgathered there. If we got caught, it meant the whole class in disgrace,as it would be a well-known fact that the members of the class who weremissing were so only because they were not asked to be present. It gaveus a great feeling of security to be fifteen strong. We were seven andthese eight more girls brought the number of law breakers up to fifteen.There were only twenty-five Juniors in the school and that left tengirls who were either too goody-goody to be included or not sufficientlyattractive, which is not in itself a crime but is certainly unfortunate.
The spread was wonderful. The little dabs of ice cream and cake we hadbeen served at the party had only whetted our appetites and in no waydiminished them. We ate in silence broken by whispers and giggles. Wehoped the teachers and Miss Plympton were safe in their downies and wetrusted in Mr. Ryan's superstitious nature to keep him out of the Gym.
The ghost dance began later and was kept up buoyantly, without musicexcept a weird rhythmic whistling that the dancers themselves furnished.This whistling is done by sucking in and never blowing out and theeffect is most uncanny. It is very hard on your wind to whistle thisway, but when your breath gives out, your partner picks up the tunewhere you leave off and keeps the ball rolling.
The last candle burned down to its socket and guttered out, and then thespectres flitted back to their rooms. It was pitch black in thecorridors and Annie was afraid to go alone, so we formed a cordon bycatching hold of hands and crept along, keeping close to the walls. Iwas in front and once when we were quite near our rooms I came bangagainst a human hand groping along the wall towards me. I stopped deadstill! It was all I could do to keep from squealing right out, but asound of scurrying down the hall reassured me. It was just a student asafraid of being caught as I was.
"Who goes there?" I demanded in stern and grown-up tones.
No answer but more scurrying and in a moment the sound of a doorcautiously closed.
"Some poor girl scared to death," I thought. We found our rooms in thedark and with the help of an electric search light, the pride of Dee'sheart, we snatched our poor dummies out of their warm beds and were soonsnuggled down in their places.
"How do you reckon it happened there were no lights in the halls?"whispered Dum.
"Nancy Blair told me she had turned them out on purpose," said Dee. "Shesaid she knew we would get caught if there was any light."
"Good for Nance!" I murmured, and knew no more until morning. I can'tbelieve we had done anything so very wrong or we could not have slept sosoundly.
The rising gong found us dead to the world and only the telephone call,three knocks on the wall, aroused us.
"Trouble ahead!" whispered Mary Flannagan, "there was some one snoopingaround last night after we were all in bed."
"Well, we can prove an alibi. Who was it?" I chattered through the'phone. I had jumped out of bed and was huddled in the closet behindDum's dress. The window was still up and the heat turned off.
"You sound scared! Do you think they will catch us?"
"Scared! Not a bit of it! I am just cold. Of course, they won't catchus,--thanks to having abolished the honour system," and I hung up thereceiver and commenced the Herculean task of getting Tweedles out ofbed.
"Get up!" I urged, pulling the cover off of first one then the other. "Idon't see what you would have done without a roommate. I'd like to knowwho would wake you up."
Dee put her head under the pillow like an ostrich trying to evadepursuit and Dum curled up in a little ball like a big caterpillar whenyou tickle him with a piece of grass.
"Girls! Get up! I tell you Mary says there is some mischief brewing. Wehad better get up and be down to breakfast in time with smiling morningfaces or Miss Plympton will know who was up late feasting. Me for a coldbath!"
"Me, too!" tweedled the twins, coming to life very rapidly.
A cold plunge and vigorous rubbing took off all traces of the night'sdissipations, and as a finishing touch we all of us let our hair hangdown our backs in plaits. Since the summer we had with one accord turnedup our hair. We felt that it added dignity to our years; but now was notime for dignity but for great simplicity and innocence.
As the breakfast gong sounded, I am sure in all Virginia there could notbe found five more demure maidens than tripped punctually into thedining room. Miss Plympton looked sharply up as we came in, but we feltwe had disarmed her with the very sweet bows we gave her and the gentle"good mornings."
There was an air of repressed excitement running through the school. Wewere dying to ask what it was but felt that silence on our part was theonly course for us to pursue. Certainly there were fifteen veryshiny-eyed Juniors and ten very smug-looking ones. I whispered to NancyBlair as I passed her table on the way out:
"What's up?"
"I am not sure, but I do not believe they are on to our frolic."
"There is something else," declared Jean Rice, who sat next to her chum,Nancy. "The servants are in a great state of excitement over something.I have had an oatmeal spoon and a butter knife spilled down my neckalready and I see Miss Plympton's private cream pitcher has found itsway to our table."
"Well, we will find out what is the matter in Chapel," I sighed, as Ihurried up to my room to put it to some kind of rights. I wanted to getour dummies pulled to pieces, leaving no semblance of human beings. Wehad twenty minutes between breakfast and Chapel to make our beds and dowhat cleaning to our rooms we considered necessary to pass inspection. Itell you we cleaned that room with what Mammy Susan called "a lick a
nd apromise." Our dummies we pulled to pieces and scattered their membersto the four winds, like the Scarecrow in the Wizard of Oz, when thewinged monkeys got him. The telephone we concealed even more carefullythan usual, draping a sweater over it and smoothing out Dum's dress sono suspicious wrinkle remained.
"We weren't in our beds very long, so let's spread 'em," said Dee,suiting the action to the word and pulling up her sheets in the mostapproved unhygienic manner. We swept the dirt under the rugs and with afew slaps of a dust rag on bureau, chairs and tables, and a carefullowering of the shade so the light came in sufficiently softened not toshow the dust, we betook ourselves to Chapel as the gong sounded,quaking inwardly but with that "butter won't melt in my mouth"expression we considered suitable for the occasion.
Miss Plympton was on the platform waiting for the teachers and pupils toassemble. She had on a stiff, new, dark gray suit that fitted her likethe paper on the wall and she was making chins so fast there was nokeeping up with them.
"Looks like tin armor and I tell you she is ready for a joust, too!"exclaimed Dum.
Without any warning at all, Miss Plympton opened the Bible at the tenthchapter of Nehemiah and began to read:
"'Now those that sealed were Nehemiah, the Tirshatha, the son ofHachaliah, and Zidkijah, Seraiah, Azariah, Jeremiah, Pashur, Amariah,Malchijah, Hattush, Shebaniah, Malluch, Harim, Meremoth, Obadiah,Daniel, Ginnethon, Baruch, Meshullam, Abijah, Mijamin, Maaziah, Bilgai,Shemaiah: these were the priests.'"
I heard a sharply intaken breath from Dee. I also noticed the shouldersof a girl a few seats ahead of me shaking ominously.
Miss Plympton proceeded: "'And the Levites: both Jeshua, the son ofAzaniah, Binnui of the sons of Henadad, Kadmiel; And their brethrenShebaniah, Hodijah, Kelita, Pelaiah, Hanan, Micha, Rehob, Hashabiah,Zaccur, Sherebiah, Shebaniah, Hodijah, Bani, Beninu,'----"
Other shoulders were shaking and Dee buried her face in her hands. Therewas an unmistakable snort from a dignified Senior. One of the tinylittle girls giggled outright and suddenly without any one knowing howit started, the whole school was in a roar.
Now it is not so difficult to come down on a few offenders, but when awhole school goes to pieces what is the one in command to do? It wasn'tthat there was anything so very humorous in the tenth chapter ofNehemiah, but the way Miss Plympton read it; the way she rattled offthose impossible names with as much ease as she would have shown incalling the roll, the way she looked in her tight new suit,--just theway the whole school felt, anyhow--a kind of tense feeling thatsomething was going to happen, made our risibles get the better of us.Everything in the room rocked with laughter except Miss Plympton. Shejust made chins.
The teachers on the platform were as bad as the students. Miss Ball wascompletely overcome and the very dried-up instructor in mathematics hadto be led off the platform in the last stages of hysterics. MargaretSayre told me afterwards that she was very glad to do the leading as sheherself was at the bursting point.
Miss Plympton looked at the giggling and roaring mass of girls andquietly went on reading in her hard even tones, her voice slightlyraised, however: "'The chief of the people: Parosh, Pahath-moab, Elam,Zatthu, Bani, Bunni; Azgad, Bebai, Adonijah, Bigvai, Adin, Ater'----"
The laughter of some of the girls changed to weeping and about half theschool had hysterics. Miss Plympton did not understand girls at all, butshe understood them well enough to know that when once hysterics getsstarted in a crowd of girls there is no more stopping it than a stampedeof wild cattle.
I hate sacrilege, but for the life of me I can't see why any one shouldthink that any human being could get any good or spiritual strength forthe day from listening to the tenth chapter of Nehemiah. I never heardof a school breaking out into hysterics over the twenty-third Psalm orthe Sermon on the Mount. Why should not a suitable thing be chosen toread to young people?
Miss Plympton was furious, but whatever she said to the pupils, shewould have to say to the teachers, so she held her peace and aftermaking some hundred or so chins she had prayers and then a mild hymn.The storm had subsided except for an occasional sniff. Some of the mosthysterically inclined had been forced to leave the assembly room andthese came sneaking back during the singing of the hymn. The Mathteacher had to go to bed and we all with one accord blessed Sheribiah,Shebiniah, Hodijah, Bani, and Beninu.