Grace Harlowe\'s Problem
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Jessie Graham Flower >> Grace Harlowe\'s Problem
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"Which shall be proven when we return triumphantly with a few armfuls of
bones," flung back Emma as she hurried to catch up with Grace, Arline,
Ruth and Anne, who had already started.
"What would life be without Emma Dean?" eulogized Sue Emerson after
Emma's vanishing back. "Sara and I are always quoting her at home. It
seems so strange that until the Sempers organized we never knew her very
well. It was through Grace we learned to know Emma."
"The longer I know Grace Harlowe the prouder I am to be her friend,"
said Elfreda slowly.
"That is the way we all think about Grace," was Sue Emerson's quick
return. "You and Miriam are especially lucky in having her for a chum."
The four young women talked on until a long, clear trill announced the
return of the other half of the exploring party. "Where, oh, where, are
the mastodon's bones?" called out Sara Emerson jeeringly, as soon as
Emma Dean came within hailing distance and empty-handed.
"Buried out of sight and as hard as stones," came Emma's rhymed
rejoinder.
"How do you know how hard they are if they're buried out of sight!"
scoffed Sara as Emma came up beside her.
"Mere supposition, my child, mere supposition."
The strollers had now reached the impromptu camp and were smiling over
the exchange of words on the part of Emma and Sara.
"It was a delightful walk," declared Grace. "I'd like to spend two or
three days in these woods."
"Stay over another week and do it," tempted Elfreda.
"I can't." Grace shook her head regretfully. "I must spend one week at
home before I leave for Overton, and I simply must be at Overton, and in
Harlowe House, at least a week before it opens. There are so many things
to be done. Thank goodness, I'll have Emma to help me this year. Last
fall I felt as lonely as a shipwrecked mariner when I landed on the
station platform at Overton. Then I heard Emma Dean's voice behind me.
I truly believe that was the pleasantest surprise of my life."
"There, twins! Now you hear what others think of me," exclaimed Emma in
triumph. "Perhaps, hereafter, you'll be more appreciative of my many
lovely qualities."
"We never said you were the worst person in the world," conceded Julia.
"Neither did you ever refer to me as the 'pleasantest surprise' of your
life," reminded Emma.
"You're a constant surprise, Emma, and always a funny one," was Sara's
magnanimous tribute.
"Twins, you are forgiven. You may sit beside me, if you're good, while
we eat luncheon. I can be magnanimous, too."
The big luncheon hampers were brought out by Elfreda and Miriam. A
tablecloth was laid on the grass, and the luncheon was spread forth in
all its glory. There were several kinds of toothsome sandwiches, salads,
olives and pickles, fruit and plenty of sweets for dessert. There was
coffee in two large thermos bottles, and there was also imported ginger
ale. The hungry girls lost no time in seating themselves about this al
fresco luncheon, making the quiet hollow ring with the merry talk and
laughter of their last delightful frolic together.
CHAPTER III
PLANNING FOR THE FUTURE
After the picnickers had finished luncheon they still sat about the
remains of the feast, talking busily of what they hoped to accomplish
during the coming year.
Elfreda was full of plans as to what she intended to do when she had
finished her course in the law school and passed the bar. "When I'm a
full-fledged lawyer----" she began.
"You mean a lawyeress," corrected Emma. "Don't contradict me. Let me
explain. True the word's not in the dictionary. I just coined it. I'm
going to teach it and its uses in my classes this fall. I shall begin by
referring to my friend, Miss J. Elfreda Briggs, the distinguished
lawyeress. That will excite the curiosity of my classes. Then instead of
satisfying that curiosity as to Lawyeress Briggs' personal and private
history I shall gently lead them to a serious contemplation of the word
itself. Once in use, I'll have it put in a revised edition of the
dictionary. It's high time there were a few new words introduced into
the English language. I can make up beautiful ones and not half try.
It's so easy."
"And the faculty trusted her to teach English," murmured Miriam.
There was a chorus of giggles at this observation, in which even Emma
joined.
"Make up some new words now," challenged Julia Emerson.
"Not when I'm on a picnic," refused Emma firmly. "'Work while you work
and play while you play.' I came out to play."
"Our play days end to-night," smiled Grace. "At least mine do."
"Mine, too," echoed Arline. "Really, girls, you haven't any idea of how
busy settlement work keeps one. I spend several hours each day at the
rooms which Father let me have fitted up for a Girls' Club, and I visit
the very poor people, and almost every evening I have a class or a
meeting. One evening I go to a little chapel on the East Side to tell
stories to children, and I teach classes two other nights. There's
always something extra coming up, too. Father isn't exactly pleased over
it. He thinks I work too hard. Now that Ruth is going to spend the
winter with me I'll make her help. She is the laziest person. She hasn't
accomplished a single thing since she found her father."
"He wouldn't let me," defended Ruth. "It has been hard labor to persuade
him to allow me to stay in New York this winter. Besides I believe that
my business of life, for the present, at least, is to try to make up for
some of the years we spent apart."
"Good for you, Ruth," applauded Miriam. "You and I are of the same mind.
Only I'm enlisted in the cause of a mother instead of a father. But all
this leads up to what I intended to tell you girls before we separated.
We are going to New York City for the winter. David is going into
business there."
"To New York!" came simultaneously from Arline and Grace. There were
murmurs of surprise from the other girls. J. Elfreda Briggs alone smiled
knowingly.
"What are we to do in Oakdale without you, at Christmas time, Miriam?"
asked Grace mournfully. "The Eight Originals Plus Two can't celebrate
unless you are with them. Somehow every year we've all managed to gather
home at Christmas. Now if you go to New York to live next winter perhaps
David won't be able to leave his business, and your mother will need you
and----"
"And do I live to hear Grace Harlowe borrowing trouble?" broke in Emma
Dean. "Our intrepid, dauntless, invincible Grace!"
"I'm afraid you do," admitted Grace. "I couldn't help mourning a little.
It was all so sudden. Anne, aren't you astonished?"
"Anne looks as though she'd known it a long while," observed Elfreda
shrewdly.
"I knew David was going into business in New York," confessed Anne, her
face flushing, "but I didn't know the rest."
"Neither did I, until this morning," smiled Miriam.
"It seems as though we are the only persons in this august body that
haven't any plans," declared Julia Emerson wistfully. "Here are Grace,
Anne and Emma, regular salaried individuals. Arline is a busy little
worker. Miriam and Ruth are at least useful members of society, and
Elfreda is an aspiring professional. Sara and I are just the Emerson
twins, with no lofty aims in view, or deeds of glory to perform."
"You and Sara are not quite useless," comforted Emma. "Just think what a
continual source of inspiration you are to me. Some of my finest
observations on life have been prompted by my acquaintance with you."
"I'm glad we are of some account in the world," grinned Sara. "I'd
really quite forgotten about you, Emma. Thank you so much for reminding
me."
"Oh, not at all," Emma beamed patronizingly upon her. "No matter how
much others may malign you, I am still your friend."
"Emma Dean, you ridiculous creature, why won't you take us seriously?"
laughed Julia, but her voice still held an undercurrent of wistfulness.
"Does the fact that we are twins have this hilarious effect upon you?"
"I wonder if that's the reason," murmured Emma. Then dropping her usual
bantering tone, she fixed earnest eyes on the black-eyed twins.
"Seriously, Julia and Sara, I know just the way you feel about having no
particular life work picked out. When I went home after I was graduated
from Overton I hadn't the least idea of where I'd fit in in life. Then I
found that Father needed my help, and I've been head over ears in work
ever since. One never knows what may happen, or how quickly one's work
may find one. It may not be what one would like it to be, but it will
undoubtedly be the best thing in life for one, and one is likely to see
it coming around the corner at almost any minute."
"That's very, very true." It was Grace who spoke. "Don't you remember
how I worried about finding my work, and it walked directly up to me and
introduced itself on Commencement day?"
"I never dreamed that the stage would put me through college and be my
work afterward," broke in Anne. "When first I went to Oakdale I supposed
I had left it behind forever. But it must have been my destiny after
all."
"I guess it's just about as well in the long run not to worry about what
your work is going to be until it knocks at your door," observed
Elfreda. "Children are always planning and talking about what they're
going to do and be when they grow up; then they always do something
different. What do you suppose I used to say I was going to be when I
grew up?"
"Some perfectly absurd thing," anticipated Miriam. Eight pairs of amused
eyes fixed themselves expectantly on Elfreda.
"Well," Elfreda chuckled reminiscently, "my aim and ambition was to be a
cook. Not because I was so deeply in love with cooking, but because I
liked to eat. No wonder I was fat. I used to haunt the kitchen on baking
days and shriek with an outraged stomach afterward. The shrieking
occurred most frequently in the middle of the night. Then Ma would come
to my rescue, and I'd be forbidden to sample the baking again. So to
console myself in my banishment I'd resolve that when I grew up I'd be a
cook and live in a kitchen all the time. I reasoned that if I _was_ a
cook I'd know how to make everything in the world to eat and could have
what I pleased. Besides no one would dare tell me I couldn't have this
or that. This was all very consoling during the times I had to keep out
of the kitchen. Generally in about a week's time Ma would relent, and,
as our cook was fond of me, I'd be reinstated in my beloved realm of
eats. But it was during these periods of exile that my ambition always
rose to fever heat. Then our old cook got married, and I didn't like our
new one. She didn't appreciate my companionship on baking days. Our old
cook had always encouraged me in my ambition. She used to tell me long
tales about the places where she had worked and the cooking feats she
had performed. The new cook said I was a nuisance, and complained to Ma.
So my ambition died for lack of encouragement, but my appetite didn't. I
became an outlaw instead and made raids on the baking. So that
particular cook and I were always at war. About that time Ma began
giving me a regular allowance, so I haunted the baker and candy shops
instead of the kitchen, and the cook idea declined. In fact all I know
about cooking now, I learned at Wayne Hall, in the interest of my
friends," she finished.
Elfreda's reminiscence awoke a train of sleeping memories in the minds
of the others, and for the next hour the quiet woodland echoed with
their mirth over the curious, quaint and ridiculous aims and fancies of
their childhood. The talk gradually drifted back to serious things and
went on so earnestly that it was well after four o'clock before the
party began to make reluctant preparations to return to the cottage.
"It has been a perfect day and a perfect picnic," declared Grace as she
smiled lovingly at her friends. "We'll never forget Elfreda's house
party."
"I'm going to have you with me at this time every year if it is
possible," planned Elfreda. "So when September comes next year just mark
off the last two weeks on the calendar as set aside for the Briggs'
reunion and arrange your affairs accordingly. Is it a go?"
"Hurrah for the Briggs' reunion," cheered Arline.
The cheers were given and the picnickers started up the hill to where
their automobiles were stationed. Grace and Elfreda brought up the rear
with the luncheon hamper.
"That's dear in you to ask us here every year, Elfreda," said Grace.
"It's a splendid way for us always to keep in touch with one another.
You are forever doing nice things for others."
"Others," retorted Elfreda, gruffly. "I'm the most selfish person that
ever lived. I'm not planning half so much to make you girls happy as I
am to be happy myself. Every time I think that I might have gone to some
other college and never have known you and Miriam and Anne, it nearly
gives me nervous prostration. By the way, Grace, I have an idea Miriam
is going to find her work pretty suddenly. I could see at commencement
that Mr. Southard was in love with her. She didn't know it then. She
knows it now though, and she likes him."
"You certainly _can_ see what is hidden from the eyes of the rest of us.
How do you know she knows it?"
"Oh, she was talking to me the other day about Anne, and she mentioned
Mr. Southard's name in a kind of self-conscious way, not in the least
like her usual self. I could almost swear she blushed, but I couldn't
quite see that," grinned Elfreda.
"I'm surprised," laughed Grace; then she added slowly, "I've known for a
long time that Mr. Southard was in love with Miriam. Anne discovered it
at commencement, too. I hope Miriam _does_ love him. Somehow they seem
so perfectly suited to each other. I never could quite fancy she and
Arnold Evans as being in love."
"It looks as though you'd soon be the only unengaged member of the
Originals," remarked Elfreda innocently.
Grace's face clouded. Elfreda had touched upon a sore subject. Just
before leaving Oakdale on her visit to Elfreda she had seen Tom. He had
not renewed his old plea, but Grace knew that he was still waiting and
hoping for the words that would make him happy.
"Elfreda," her voice trembled a little, "you know, I think, that Tom
wishes me to marry him. I'm sorry, but I can't. I just can't. I suppose
I'll be the odd member of the feminine half of the Originals, but I
can't help it. My work still means more to me than life with Tom, and
I'm never going to give it up. So there."
Elfreda nodded. Her nod expressed more than words, but secretly she had
a curious presentiment that Grace would one day wake up to the fact that
she had make a mistake. Still there was no use in telling her so. It
might make her still more stubborn in her resolve. Elfreda greatly
admired Tom, and, with her usually quick perception, had estimated him
at his true worth. "He's worthy of her, and she's worthy of him," was
her mental summing up, "and it strikes me that '_never_' is a pretty
long time. Whether she can shut love out of her life forever, just for
the sake of her work, is a problem that nobody but Grace Harlowe can
solve."
CHAPTER IV
MILESTONES
"Sh-h-h! No giggles. If you don't creep along as still as mice she'll
hear you," warned a sibilant whisper.
Five young women, headed by Emma Dean, smoothed the laughter from their
faces and stole, cat-like, up the green lawn to the wide veranda at the
rear of Harlowe House. One by one they noiselessly mounted the steps.
Emma, finger on her lips, cast a comical glance at the maid, who
tittered faintly; then the stealthy procession crept down the hall in
the direction of Grace Harlowe's little office. There was an instant's
silent rallying of forces of which the young woman at the desk, who sat
writing busily, was totally unconscious, then, of a sudden, she heard a
ringing call of "Three cheers for Loyalheart!" and sprang to her feet
only to be completely hemmed in by friendly arms.
"You wicked girls! I mean, you dear things," she laughed. "How nice of
you to descend upon me in a body. I must kiss every one of you. Patience
and Kathleen, when did you set foot in Overton? I've been watching and
waiting for you. Mary Reynolds, this _is_ a surprise. I didn't expect
you until next week, and Evelyn, too, looking lovelier than ever. As for
Emma, she's a continual surprise and pleasure." Grace embraced one after
another of the five girls.
"I'm so glad I thought of this nice surprise," beamed Emma, craning her
neck, and pluming herself vaingloriously. "I have another beautiful
thought, too, seething in my fertile brain. Let's go down to Vinton's
and celebrate."
"I knew some one was sure to propose that," laughed Patience. "I
intended to be that some one, but Emma forestalled me."
"I'm as busy as can be, but I can't resist the call to my old haunts,"
laughed Grace. "Besides, it's such a perfect day. Leave your bags in the
living room, girls. I feel highly honored to know that you and Kathleen
came straight to me, Patience."
"The old case of the needle and the magnet," explained Patience with a
careless wave of her hand.
"Oh, Miss Harlowe I'm so glad to see you," was Mary Reynolds' fervent
tribute.
"So am I," declared Evelyn Ward, with an emphatic nod of her golden
head. "I've had a perfectly wonderful summer, Miss Harlowe. I loved my
part. It hasn't been very hot in New York City, either, and I spent my
Sundays and some of my week days with the Southards at their Long
Island summer home. I have thought of you many times. I hope you'll
forgive me for not writing you oftener. Kathleen and I came down on the
same train." She poured forth all this information almost in a breath.
"Of course I'll forgive you," returned Grace. "I'm a very lax
correspondent, too. I'm so glad you've been well, and that you liked
your part."
"You should have seen her in it, Grace," put in Kathleen. "She made an
adorable Constance Devon, and her gowns were beautiful. The girl who
understudied her, and who will play the part on the road, isn't half so
stunning. Patience saw her, too."
"She was a credit to herself and Overton," verified Patience.
"I thank you, most grave and reverend seniors." Evelyn, her eyes shining
with the pleasure of well-earned praise, made a low bow to Patience and
Kathleen.
"'Most grave and reverend seniors,'" repeated Grace, slipping in between
her two friends, her hand on an arm of each.
Kathleen's sharp black eyes grew tender with the love she bore Grace.
"Yes," came her soft answer, "Patience and I are seniors at last. We've
reached Senior Lane, and I hope to leave some milestones as we pass
through it. Dear as the others have been, I'd like to rise to greater
heights this year. I don't know just what I'd like to do," she flushed
and laughed at her own enthusiasm, "but I'd like to do something worth
while."
"So would I," murmured Evelyn Ward.
"I want to be friends with every one, and not be conditioned," was Mary
Reynolds' modest petition.
"_I_ don't know just what sort of milestones I'd like to leave. Only
decorative ones, of course. I wish to keep my lane free from weeds and
ugly, jagged rocks." This from Patience.
"You might begin at once and leave a milestone at Vinton's, for being a
willing, little reveler," suggested Emma with meaning.
"Come on, girls," rallied Kathleen. "We must show Emma just how willing
we are. Allow me, my dear Miss Dean," she offered her arm to Emma, and
they paraded down the hall, out the door and down the steps with great
ceremony. Mary, Grace, Patience and Evelyn followed. Patience walked
with Evelyn, while Grace and Mary brought up the rear.
"Oh, Miss Harlowe," began Mary, with intense earnestness, "you haven't
any idea of how much Kathleen--she likes me to call her Kathleen--has
done for me this summer. I knew last spring that I must earn my living
through the summer, in some way, but I never dreamed that it would be
in such a nice way."
"I am anxious to hear all about it," returned Grace. "When you wrote me
that Kathleen had secured work for you on her paper I was so pleased."
"Yes, I was the assistant on the woman's page," related Mary. "Of course
my work wasn't so very important. It was mostly clipping things from
other papers, but I used to write the paragraph under the fashion
drawings, and sometimes I went out to the big department stores to look
for interesting new fads and fashions for women. Three times I wrote
short articles, so you see I actually appeared in print. Kathleen made
me take half of her room, and so my board wasn't very expensive. My
salary was fifteen dollars a week. I have enough new clothes to last me
all winter, and I've saved eighty-five dollars. That will help pay my
tuition this year, and Kathleen is sure she can sell some children's
stories I've written. Wouldn't it be glorious, Miss Harlowe, if some day
I'd become a writer?" Mary's eyes shone with the distant prospect of
future honors.
"It looks to me as though you were on the right road," encouraged Grace.
"The only thing to do is to keep on writing. The more you write the
easier it will become--that is, if you are really gifted. Kathleen has
great faith in you. You must show her that it is well founded."
"How inspiring you are, Miss Harlowe." Mary looked her gratitude at
Grace's hopeful words; then she added in a slightly lower tone: "I'm so
glad everything went so beautifully for Evelyn. I saw her twice in 'The
Reckoning.' She looked _beautiful_, and her acting was so clever.
She--she told me of her own accord about"--Mary hesitated--"things. It
would have hurt me dreadfully if Evelyn had not come back to Overton. I
love her dearly."
Grace nodded sympathetically. She understood the remarkable effect of
Evelyn's beauty upon Mary. Still, she reflected, it had not been potent
enough to lure Mary from standing by her colors at the crucial moment.
Grace realized that this poor orphan girl, whose only home was Harlowe
House, possessed a steadfast, upright nature that must in time win her
not only scores of loyal friends, but the respect of all who knew her,
as well.
A sudden trill from Kathleen caused them to quicken their steps. The
others were standing in front of Vinton's, waiting for them. Once inside
the pretty tea room that had been the scene of so many of their revels,
with one accord they made for the alcove table.
"Shades of Arline Thayer," laughed Emma. "I am haunted by her. I can see
her sitting in that chair, her little hands folded on the table, saying,
'What are we going to eat, girls?' She loved this alcove and every stick
and stone of Vinton's. She never cared so much for Martell's."
By this time they had seated themselves at the round table and begun to
order their luncheon. Vinton's was productive of reminiscences, and they
were soon deep in the discussion of past events, grave and gay, that had
dotted their college life. Evelyn and Mary were for the most part
listeners, but Grace, Patience, Emma and Kathleen fairly bubbled over
with by-gone college history.
"I love to hear about the things that happened to Miss Harlowe and Miss
Dean when they were students," confided Mary to Evelyn under cover of a
general laugh over one of Emma Dean's ridiculous reminiscences.
"So do I," nodded Mary, then she added in a still lower tone, "Have you
noticed the girl at the table near the door, Evelyn. She came in about
ten minutes ago, and she's watched this table every second since she
came."
"Yes, I noticed her. She's pretty, isn't she? That's a stunning suit she
is wearing. Her hat is miles above reproach, too." Evelyn could not
repress her admiration for beautiful clothes.
At that moment Kathleen spoke to her and she turned to answer the
latter's question. When next her eyes turned toward the pretty girl it
was just as they were leaving the tea shop. Evelyn was the last member
of the sextette to pass the table. She glanced at the girl only to note
that she was searching a small leather bag frantically, a look of
indescribable alarm in her eyes. "It's gone," she said, half aloud.
Something prompted Evelyn to halt. "Good afternoon," she said. "I
heard--that is--can I help you?"
A shade of annoyance darkened the stranger's face. It was replaced by an
expression of fright. "I've lost my money," she said in a dazed voice.
"It was all I had. I can't pay for my luncheon. I don't know what to
do." Her voice rose to an anxious note.
"Give me your check," said Evelyn quietly. "I'll pay the cashier. You
can pay me later."
"Oh, thank you," breathed the girl. "You don't know how I hated the idea
of going to the cashier and telling her I had no money. I'm _so_ worried
about my purse. I had over a hundred dollars in it. I haven't seen it
since I left the train. Just before we reached Overton I went into the
lavatory to fix my hair. I laid my bag down. There was another woman
there at the mirror. She must have slipped her fingers into my bag and
taken my purse, for when I picked up the bag it was open. I snapped it
shut and paid no attention to it then. I didn't think of it until I
reached for my purse to count out the money for my luncheon."
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