WHEN SARAH WENT
TO SCHOOL

[(page 18)]

IT IS NOT RIGHT FOR ME TO GO

WHEN SARAH WENT
TO SCHOOL

BY ELSIE SINGMASTER

AUTHOR OF "WHEN SARAH SAVED THE DAY"

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS

BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY

The Riverside Press Cambridge

COPYRIGHT, 1910, BY ELSIE SINGMASTER
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED INCLUDING THE RIGHT TO REPRODUCE
THIS BOOK OR PARTS THEREOF IN ANY FORM
Published October 1910

PRINTED IN THE U.S.A.

TO THE MEMORY OF OUR
GRANDMOTHER
SARAH MATTERN SINGMASTER

"What did the other children do?
And what were childhood, wanting you?"

CONTENTS

ILLUSTRATIONS

From drawings by Wilson C. Dexter.

WHEN SARAH WENT TO
SCHOOL

CHAPTER I THE DRESS PARADE

Across the angle of the post-and-rail fence at the lower corner of the Wenners' yard, a board had been laid, and behind the board stood a short, slender, bright-eyed young girl, her hands busy with an assortment of small articles spread out before her. There were a few glass beads, a string of buttons, half a dozen small, worn toys, a basket of early apples, and a plate of crullers. When they were arranged to her satisfaction, she took an apple in one hand and a cruller in the other, and, climbing the fence, perched on the upper rail and began to eat.

Before she had taken more than two bites an extraordinary procession appeared round the corner of the house. Ellen Louisa, one of the Wenner twins, dressed in a long gingham dress of her sister-in-law's, leaned affectionately upon the arm of the other twin, Louisa Ellen, who wore with ludicrous effect a coat and hat of their brother William's. Clinging to Louisa Ellen's hand was a small fat boy. They solemnly approached the improvised store.

"Is any one at home in this store?" asked Louisa Ellen in a gruff voice.

The proprietress slid down from the top of the fence. She spoke carefully, but she did not quite succeed in disguising her Pennsylvania-German accent.

"Well, sir, what is it to-day?"

"I want—" It was Ellen Louisa, who spoke in a simpering tone—"I want a penny's worth of what you can get the most of for a penny, missis. I want it for my little boy. Apples will do. He has it sometimes in his stomach, and—"

A loud crash interrupted Ellen Louisa's account of Albert's delicate constitution. He had seized the propitious moment for the purloining of two crullers, and in order to establish his ownership, had taken a large bite out of each. It was the storekeeper's quick grab which brought the counter to the ground, and mingled all the wares in wild confusion on the grass.

Albert looked frightened. When, instead of scolding, Sarah dropped to her knees and helped him gather up the toys, he stared at her, bewildered.

"You'd catch it if I wasn't going to the Normal to-morrow to be learned!" said Sarah. "But to-day is a special day. What shall we play next?"

The twins swiftly shed their superfluous garments, and became two thin little girls, who could scarcely be told apart. Their plaid gingham aprons waved in the breeze as they danced about.

"Let us play 'Uncle Daniel,'" they cried together.

Even sixteen-year-old Sarah hopped up and down at the brilliancy of the suggestion. Uncle Daniel Swartz was their mother's brother, who lived on the next farm. After their mother and father had died, and their older brother had apparently disappeared into the frozen North, whither he had gone to seek his fortune, Uncle Daniel, who had long coveted the fine farm, had attempted to divide the little family and add the fertile acres to his own. It was Sarah who had stubbornly opposed him, holding bravely out until William had come home. William had married pretty Miss Miflin, the district-school teacher, and, giving up his plans for further adventure, had settled down to become a truck farmer. Already he was succeeding beyond his rosiest hopes.

Both he and his wife were anxious that Sarah should go to school, and all the summer Laura had been helping her to recall the small knowledge she had had before heavy care and responsibility had taken her from the district school. To-morrow she was to enter the sub-Junior class of the Normal School, which William and Laura had attended. Laura had corresponded with the principal, Doctor Ellis, and had engaged Sarah's room. It had been a busy summer. Sarah had kept up her Geography after she had left school, but in other branches she had needed a good deal of tutoring.

No one who saw her now, in her wild game with the twins, would have guessed that she had ever had any care or responsibility. She assumed first the character of Uncle Daniel; she told the twins that they must go to live with Aunt Mena, she tried to entice Albert away. Then she was Uncle Daniel's hired man, Jacob Kalb, who had translated his name to Calf, because he was anxious to be thought English. In this rôle she was pursued round the barn by the twins, who brandished an old, disabled gun, which in Sarah's hands had once terrified Jacob Kalb.

Once, in this delightful game, they passed close to the fence beyond which Jacob himself was working. Sarah balanced for a second on the upper rail.

"Jacob Calf,
You make me laugh!"

she shrieked, and then jumped down backward. The twins held the gun aloft, screaming with delight.

The game closed with a scene in the Orphans' Court, where Uncle Daniel demanded that he be made their guardian, and where William returned at exactly the proper and dramatic moment.

"And now," announced Sarah breathlessly, when it was all over, "I am going to say good-by to everything."

A feeling of solemnity fell suddenly upon the twins and Albert. Who would be storekeeper on the morrow? Who would be Uncle Daniel and Jacob Kalb and the judge of the Orphans' Court in swift succession? Who would help them with their lessons? Who would defend them if Uncle Daniel should ever come threatening again? Who would draw bears and tigers and "nelephunts" and all manner of birds and beasts? "May we go fishing?" they would ask Sister Laura, and Sister Laura would answer, "Yes, if Sarah will go with you." "May we write with ink?"—"Yes, if Sarah will spread some newspapers on the table, and sit beside you with her book." Would these treats be forbidden them? Or would they be allowed to do as they chose? But even independence would be distasteful without Sarah. Each twin seized her by the hand.

"It is a long time till Christmas," mourned Louisa Ellen.

"Ach, stay by us!" wailed Ellen Louisa.

"And grow up to be like Jacob Calf!" cried Sarah derisively. "I guess not! I am going to be a teacher, and if you ever get in my school, then look out! You will then find out once if you don't study. I will then learn you Latin and Greek and Algebray and more things than you ever heard of in the world, Ellen Louisa and Louisa Ellen. You would like to grow up like the fishes in the crick. Good-by, crick!" Sarah drew her hands away from the twins, and dabbled them in the cool, fresh water. "Good-by, fishes! Good-by, bridge! Good-by, bushes! Why, Ellen Louisa! Louisa Ellen!" Sarah looked at them with an expression of comical surprise. Louisa Ellen and Ellen Louisa were crying. "Stop it this minute!" She seized Albert by the hand. Albert had already opened his mouth, preparatory to joining his sisters in a wail. "Albert and I will beat you to the barn."

"One for the money,
Two for the show,
Three to make ready,
And four to go!"

Louisa Ellen and Ellen Louisa did not stop to dry their tears, but scampered over the ground like young colts, their skirts flying. When Albert and Sarah got to the door, the twins had vanished, and there ensued a game of hide and seek such as the old barn had never smiled upon. Sarah climbed about like a monkey. She seemed to be in half a dozen places at once. The twins thought she was downstairs in one of the mangers, when suddenly her voice was heard from the top of the haymow. They played tag on the barn-floor, they sang, they danced, with Sarah always in the lead. It was certain that the stately Normal School would open its doors on the morrow to no such hoyden as this.

They were in the midst of

"Barnum had a nelephunt,
Chumbo was his name, sir,"

when the barn-door opened, and a young woman appeared. She watched them for a moment silently.

"Well, young Indians," she said.

The oldest of the young Indians clasped her hands in distress.

"Is it time to get supper already?"

"Not quite. And if four members of the family didn't insist upon having waffles, you shouldn't help at all. Your clothes are all ready, and I want you to come and see them."

The twins raced wildly toward the house, and Sarah followed more slowly with her sister-in-law and Albert. She looked shyly and gratefully at Laura. She had not yet grown quite accustomed to having "Teacher" a member of the family. She had so long looked up to her with awe and admiration that her constant presence in the house did not seem quite real. Laura often laughed at her.

"I should think, Sarah, that after you had cleared up my outrageous bread-dough three times, and had taken my burnt pies from the oven, you would begin to feel fairly well acquainted with me."

Sarah flushed with embarrassment. It was true that Laura was slow about learning to cook. But cooking was such an ordinary, every-day accomplishment! It was much more remarkable never to have had to cook.

"But now you can make good bread and pies," she would insist.

The whole summer had seemed like a dream. The house was no longer strange and dark and lonely as it had been after their father had died. Sarah no longer crept fearfully about at night, fastening the shutters before dark, for fear that Uncle Daniel would try to get in. It had been a happy, happy summer. William came and went, whistling, teasing the twins, riding fat Albert round on his shoulder. Uncle Daniel annoyed them no more. "Teacher" bent with flushed face over the stove, laughing at her mistakes, and calling occasionally to Sarah for help; and Sarah herself sat by the window, a little table before her, on which were books and paper and pencils.

The little table was gone from the window now, the lessons with Laura were over, to-morrow night Sarah would sleep away from home for the first time in her life. They had expected that the trolley company, which had given them a good price for the right of way through the farm, would have finished its line, and that Sarah would have been able to go back and forth to school each week. But the tracks had just begun to creep out from the county-seat.

The twins had run upstairs; their deep ohs! and achs! could be heard in the kitchen below. They shrieked for Sarah, who was already on the steps.

When she looked round the familiar room, she clasped her hands and then stood perfectly still. Beside her bed was an open trunk, and spread out on the bed itself and on the twins' trundle-bed was her outfit for school. There were two school dresses, and a better dress and a best dress,—the last of red cashmere, with bands of silk. There were new shoes and a new coat and two hats and gloves and an umbrella and handkerchiefs and underwear, all marked with her name, and a gymnasium suit, and a scarlet kimono and a comfort and pencils and tablets and—Sarah began suddenly to tremble—a little silver watch and chain and a fountain-pen.

"The little watch was my first one, Sarah," explained her sister-in-law. "It keeps good time. And the fountain-pen is from William, and the umbrella—"

"And the umberella"—the twins and Albert had seized upon it simultaneously—"the umberella is from us. William, he sold our Spotty Calf for us, and this is some of the money, and you can make it up and put it down, and it has a cover like a snake, and—Look at it, once!"

Sarah took the umbrella in her hand. Her school dresses had been tried on by Laura, who had made them; she had known all about those. And William and Laura had made a trip to town and had been very short and mysterious about the bundles they brought home. She had supposed they had brought a few things for her,—a new pair of shoes, perhaps, or a new shawl. But these things! Once, during her mother's lifetime, she had had a red woolen dress; she still cherished a patch which remained after it had been made over for one of the twins. Except for that, her dresses had always been of gingham or calico. And two hats, when last year she had had only a sun-bonnet! And a fountain-pen, like Laura's, and Laura's own silver watch! A lump came into Sarah's throat.

Perhaps Laura felt a lump in her own.

"Come," she said brightly but a little huskily. "You must try these things on, and you must hurry if you are going to bake waffles for this hungry brood." With one hand she took the umbrella from Sarah, with the other she unbuttoned her gingham dress. "Children, shut down the trunk-lid and sit on it. Now, Sarah, the gymnasium suit first."

Sarah chuckled hysterically as she was helped into the flannel blouse and bloomers.

"She looks like a bear," giggled Louisa Ellen.

"Like a pretty thin bear," said Sister Laura. "She will have to be fatter when she comes home. Louisa Ellen, run and get my work-basket. These elastics must be tightened. Now, Sarah, the school dresses, then the blue sailor suit and the blue hat. You are to wear those to-morrow."

Sarah stared down at her dress, still speechless with amazement and delight.

"And now the red dress. Your brother William chose this color, Sarah, and your hat and coat match it."

Fat and silent Albert opened his mouth to speak.

"She looks like—" he began, but could think of nothing to which to compare her. "She don't look like nothing."

"She looks like a—a fine lady," said Louisa Ellen. "Ach, when can we go to the Normal?"

Laura had turned down the glass in the old-fashioned bureau.

"Now, Sarah, take a good look, and then undress. These sleeves must be shortened a little. I can do that this evening. I'll pack the trunk while you get supper."

Sarah revolved obediently before the glass. But her eyes saw nothing. The lump in her throat seemed now to suffocate her; she struggled frantically to swallow it, but it only grew larger. The twins watched her in fright. Presently Louisa Ellen slid down from the trunk, and went across the room and touched Laura on the arm.

"Something is after Sarah," she whispered in shocked surprise. Never before had Sarah behaved like this.

Laura laid down her work.

"Why, Sarah, dear! What is the matter?"

It was a moment before Sarah could speak. She rubbed her eyes, then she looked down at the new red dress, and the new red coat, and then at the old gingham dress and apron on the floor, and at her hands, on which still lingered the marks of heavy toil.

"I would rather stay at home," she faltered. "Ellen Louisa and Louisa Ellen can have my things, and—and when they are big, they can go in—in the Normal. I—I would rather stay at home and do the work."

Laura sat down again in her chair by the window, and drew Sarah to her knee.

"Why would you rather stay at home, Sarah?" she asked gently. It was not strange that a reaction had come. There had been the struggle with Uncle Daniel, and then the long, hot months of summer, and now the immediate excitement of the afternoon. "Tell me, Sarah."

"I am too dumb," wailed Sarah. "Nobody can't teach me nothing."

"I thought I had taught you a good deal this summer."

"But there won't be any teachers like you at the Normal. I would rather stay at home. I am too old to go any more in the school. I am little but I am old."

"Like Runty," cried Louisa Ellen. The twins had been listening in frightened and fascinated attention. Runty was a pig which had never grown. "Runty is little, but he is old."

Even Sarah had to smile at this.

"But you will have too much work to do," she said to Laura. "It is not right for me to go."

Laura laughed.

"Cast no aspersions upon my ability to keep this house, young lady," she cried gayly. "And you will be no older than many of the girls and boys in your class. Now take off your dress and go mix your batter, and in ten minutes I'll be there, and then William will come home, and then we'll have supper, and then you must go to bed early."

When William came, there was no trace of Sarah's tears. He teased her gayly, as William always did, and said, as he helped himself to a fifth waffle, that the first four samples were pretty good, and that now he was really beginning to eat. It was not until she was safely in bed that the lump came back into her throat. This going away to school seemed suddenly worse than the long struggle against Uncle Daniel. She was going to live among strangers,—she would hear no more dear, familiar Pennsylvania-German, she would see only strange, critical faces. The Normal students would probably laugh at her, as she laughed at Jacob Kalb. They might make rhymes about her, as she made rhymes about Jacob.

Laura, who tiptoed into the room to put the red coat with its shortened sleeves into her trunk, heard her whisper.

"What did you say, Sarah?" she asked.

Sarah hid her face in her pillow in an agony of embarrassment. She could not possibly tell Laura what she was saying to herself, and Laura, thinking that she was talking in her sleep, tiptoed out again to complete her preparations for the next day's journey.

Before Sarah went to sleep, she smothered an hysterical giggle. One possible rhyme which might occur to the Normalites had come into her mind. It was that which she had been saying to herself. It was ominous, but she could not help laughing. It ran,—

"Sarah's Dutch,
She is not much."

CHAPTER II "THE NORMAL"

In the morning Sarah found, fortunately, no time for regret or grief. She had said good-by to the twins and Albert the night before, and though they had loudly insisted that they would be up in time to see her off, they did not wake and were not called. The three older members of the household had breakfast together, then the new trunk was lifted to the back of the spring-wagon, and Sarah, in her new sailor suit and blue hat, climbed to her place between William and Laura for the drive to the station.

Her heart beat so rapidly that she could not speak. She looked back at the broad, low-lying house, shadowed by a great hickory tree; at the friendly barn, which had been a playground for them all; and then at the winding, twisting stream, which made their land so fertile. Was it possible that a few days ago she had wished to go away?

Up at Uncle Daniel's house, the family was already astir. Jacob Kalb crossed the barn-yard, milk-pail in hand, disdaining to look back, though he must have heard plainly the sound of the spring-wagon.

"He will go in and peek out," laughed Sarah. "Jacob, he wouldn't miss nothing."

"'Jacob wouldn't miss anything' is what you mean, isn't it, Sarah?" asked her sister-in-law.

"Ach, yes!" cried Sarah penitently. "But what is coming?"

She grew pale. Down from the Swartz house hurried Aunt 'Liza. "She can't stop me!" said Sarah, gasping.

William laughed. "No, indeed."

Aunt 'Liza came to the side of the wagon. She had never approved of Uncle Daniel's methods.

"Here is something for Sarah," she said. "I thought while she was going off I would make her a little cake, once, and a little apple schnitz. She liked always apple schnitz."

Sarah jumped down over the wheel of the spring-wagon.

"Ach, I thank myself."

And she seized the stout lady in a fervent hug, which her aunt as fervently returned.

"And now," said Sarah happily, as she climbed back, "I am not cross over nobody, and nobody is cross over me. Ach, I know I am talking dumb again! But after I get on the cars, I will say everything right."

She could scarcely sit still. Laura and William looked at each other and smiled.

In all her life Sarah had been on the train but once. That was six months ago, when, accompanied by the twins and "Teacher," she had gone to the county-seat to protest against Uncle Daniel's being made their guardian. She was too much worried then to enjoy the roar of the great engine as it rushed upon them, the hurry with which they scrambled aboard, the wild thrill of delight as the train got under way. Now she enjoyed each sensation to the full. There had never been such a wonderful train as this, whose seats were so luxuriously cushioned, which moved so swiftly, which was so filled with interesting persons. Sarah waved her hand to William, she tried to call to him a final message to the twins, and then they were off. Sarah drew a deep breath.

"Ach!" she wailed. "My trunk!"

Laura showed her the check. "Your trunk is on the train, my dear."

"Ach, it is too wonderful!" cried Sarah. "No, I won't say ach any more. Ach, but I am going to try!" She clapped her hand over her mouth and looked up comically. "Ach—I can't express me without ach."

"Yes, you can," Laura assured her. "See the girls opposite us. They're probably going to the Normal School."

Sarah looked eagerly across the aisle. The girls were laughing and talking together as though they had not seen each other for a long time. They were tall and slender, and they were unlike any girls that Sarah's admiring eyes had ever seen. One had blonde curly hair, the other was dark, with wide, lovely eyes.

"Do you think I will know those girls?" she whispered.

"Of course you will. Those and many more."

Sarah clasped her hands happily. The stern and critical race with which she had peopled the Normal School suddenly ceased to exist, and lovely creatures like these took its place. Sarah's eyes brightened as she smoothed down her new blue dress. Then she sighed. The bothersome consciousness of her own unworthiness overwhelmed her.

"The Normal will have a hard time to make me look like them," she said to herself.

Once, long ago, when her mother and father were still alive, and the twins scarcely more than babies, the Wenners had taken a long holiday drive. One of the towns which they visited was that in which the Normal School was situated. It was then that her father promised that if Sarah studied, she should go there. She could see the school as plainly as though it were yesterday instead of eight weary years ago; she could hear her father's voice. Her recollection of the low house and the barn and the creek which they had left that morning was not more vivid. Before the train stopped, she saw the tall tower, which she remembered; she knew just how it overshadowed the other buildings. And there had been beautiful trees and tennis-courts and young people going back and forth.

She scrambled down from the train, and clung close to Laura, a little frightened by the noise and confusion about her, the loud greetings, the shouts of hackmen.

"This way to the Normal School. Take my carriage, lady!"

They picked their way round a great pile of trunks, and Laura gave Sarah's check to a baggage man. He touched his hat smilingly.

"Glad to see you back, Miss."

"Does he know you?" asked Sarah in awe.

Laura smiled. A pink glow had come into her cheeks.

"No. He only recognizes me for an old student. We'll walk down to school. It isn't far, and we'll both enjoy it."

A little farther down the street a grocer stood at the door of his shop, and to him Laura said good-morning.

"Does he know you?" asked Sarah.

"He remembers that I used to buy apples from him. That is the place to get the best apples in town. You see, coming back to school is like coming back home."

"I never thought of that," said Sarah slowly. She was to remember it clearly enough months afterward. "But—"

They had turned a corner and come out before a wide green campus. "But this ain't—ach! isn't my Normal! It—it wasn't so big, and this—this isn't my tower!"

"No, the tower you saw is the little one over yonder. This is the new Recitation Building. This wasn't here then. See, over there on the Main Building is your tower. And this is the Model School, and yonder is the Infirmary, and away back there is the Athletic Field, and—Ah, here we are!" And Laura ran up the steps of the Main Building as though she were coming to school herself.

The wide door stood open, there was a sound of cheerful talking from within. Sarah heard a man's voice lifted suddenly above the rest.

"Why, Mrs. Wenner, how do you do? And this is your sister-in-law. We are glad to see you both."

"Thank you," answered Laura. "Sarah, this is Dr. Ellis. I think you said Sarah was to have my old room."

"Yes," answered the principal. "Eugene will take you up and give you the keys. Here, Eugene."

In another minute they were in the elevator; then they went down a wide hall and turned a corner.

"Here we are. I wonder whether your room-mates are here."

It was the bell-boy who answered as he flung the door open.

"It looks so, miss."

The two newcomers stood in the doorway and gasped. Sarah was not entirely unacquainted with confusion. She knew what the kitchen at home looked like at the end of a morning's baking at which the twins and Albert had been allowed to assist. But the twins and Albert at their worst could accomplish nothing to equal this.

A room in which two trunks are being unpacked is not expected to look very neat, but this confusion seemed the result of careful effort. There were dresses scattered here and there, not on the backs of chairs, or laid across the beds, but dropped to the floor and in heaps on the table. There were shoes, not set side by side, but widely scattered, a slipper and an overshoe on the bureau, a boot and a slipper on the radiator. A drawer had been taken from the bureau and laid on a bed; into it a trunk-tray had been emptied, helter skelter, as though its contents were waste paper. Apparently the owner had been suddenly called away, for the tray still lay upside down across the drawer.

To Sarah's Pennsylvania-German eyes, the scene was terrible.

"You'll have to do some missionary work, Sarah," Laura said merrily. "This closet seems to be empty. Hang your hat here, and take that bureau. We'll turn it this way so that the light is a little better. That is the way Helen Ellingwood used to have it when she and I roomed here together. The school wasn't so crowded and there were only two of us. Now we'll take your pitcher down the hall and fill it, and by that time your trunk may come, and perhaps the owners of these clothes, also, and then we can clear up."

They made their way round the trunks and boxes in the hall. A few doors away, a girl who was bending over her trunk stood up to let them pass. She turned her face away, but not before they had seen that it was streaked with black. Her hands, too, were as black as ink, and she was crying. Laura stopped at once.

"Why, what is the matter?"

"I packed—a—bottle of ink—in my trunk, and it—it has broken. I—"

Laura looked into the depths of the trunk.

"Oh, my child! Have you taken the bottle out?"

"Yes, but the ink is there yet."

Laura pushed back her cuffs.

"Can you get me a lot of newspapers and spread them thickly on your floor? There, in the sunshine. Why, these things seem black to begin with. Your gymnasium suit is black, isn't it? And here is a black skirt. See, it hasn't reached down to your books, and the trunk isn't stained."

"But my white petticoats are—are all black." The girl's tears made white channels on her face.

Laura patted her on the shoulder. "Then wash your face and hands, and run down to the book-room and get some ink eradicator, and I'll show you how to apply it. Come, Sarah."

Sarah's bright eyes shone. Laura might not know how to make waffles, but she knew other, more wonderful things. Sarah's heart swelled; she thought of Albert and the twins in this safe care, and she slipped her hand into Laura's without a word, and Laura smiled down at her.

As they came back through the hall, they heard a cheerful voice.

"I'll unlock the door, Eugene. Yes, we're glad to be back. Move that trunk in here, please. Gertrude, you brought a trunk-cover, didn't you?"

A dark-eyed girl appeared in the doorway.

"Yes, Ethel."

"They are our girls," whispered Sarah.

"Yes, and they are evidently other people's girls."

The hall was suddenly crowded with a welcoming throng.

By this time, Sarah's room-mates had appeared. One was tall and stout; she said that her name was Ellen Ritter. The other, who was equally stout but much shorter, said that she was Mabel Thorn. It was to her that the bureau-drawer belonged. She lifted the trunk-tray and slid the drawer into place.

"Our trunks must be out of here by night," she said. "They take them to the trunk-room. Mine's ready."

"And mine," said Ellen Ritter.

She slammed down the lid, and pulled the trunk into the hall, and Mabel pushed hers after it. Two small, cleared spaces were left, otherwise there was no change in the appearance of the room. The girls did not return, even to close the door. Sarah, staring after them, saw a smiling young woman poise for an instant on the sill, a hand on either jamb.

"Well, Laura Miflin!" she said.

The speed with which Sarah had flown to meet William upon his return from Alaska was no greater than that with which Laura crossed the room.

"Helen Ellingwood!" she cried. "What are you doing here?"

"I am going to teach Elocution. Why haven't you written to me? I didn't even know you were married. I live next door. And who is this, and how are you?" And Miss Ellingwood pushed aside a pile of books and underclothes and collars and sat down on the edge of the bed. "These things don't belong 'to you nor none of your family,' I hope?"

Laura shook her head.

"This is my sister-in-law, Sarah Wenner, question number one. I am very well and very happy, question number two. No, these do not belong 'to me nor none of my family,' question number three. What would you do with them?"

"Spank the owners. Perhaps they'll clear up, though. The first day is always demoralizing. Now tell me everything you can think of."

And Miss Ellingwood shifted to a more comfortable position, and while Laura unpacked and Sarah put away, the old friends chattered until dinner-time.

The great dining-room, with all the confusion of the first day of school, was an awesome place to country-bred Sarah. She was sure that she should never know one face from another. She should never learn to find her place.

"You must sit at my table," said Miss Ellingwood. "There will be plenty of room there to-day, and this afternoon I shall have you assigned there permanently. This way"; and Miss Ellingwood put out a guiding hand. Sarah began to take courage.

The afternoon seemed as long as the morning had been short. Directly after dinner, Sarah went with Laura to the train. She did not see the rushing engine so clearly now, nor watch the streaming white smoke; her eyes, fixed firmly upon a slender figure in a brown suit, were dimmed, and the strange lump of yesterday had come back into her throat. Now, at last, the moment of separation had come.

She walked slowly back to school, and about the grounds. Laura would be getting home now, and William would have driven to the station to meet her. Had the twins done just as they were told all day? Had they remembered the deserted kittens in the barn? Would Laura be able to fix the fire for the night?

Sarah ate her supper with difficulty. Miss Ellingwood did not appear, the other students said little, Sarah could not see her room-mates, or the Ethel and Gertrude who seemed a little less strange than the other students, or the girl who had packed the ink in her trunk. At the recollection of her woe-begone face, Sarah smiled and felt better.

"She is dumber yet than I," she said to herself.

At seven o'clock there was a chapel service. The gongs rang in the halls, and there was a general opening of doors, and passing of footsteps. Sarah followed her neighbors down the hall. At the entrance to the chapel stood Miss Ellingwood, a book in her hand. She was assigning seats which the students were to keep for the year.

"Wenner, Row B, left, seat 32. Down there to the left, Sarah, near the girl in the white dress."

Sarah made her way down the sloping aisle. She had never been in any room larger than the little country church, and this chapel with its high ceiling, its fine chandeliers, seemed marvelous. In the chandeliers, strange to say, candles were burning instead of lamps.

To her dismay, her seat was directly beneath one of them. She glanced upward uneasily. There was no contrivance to catch the drippings, and everybody must know that candles dripped. She looked down at her new blue dress; it would be impossible to get candle grease out of it. She meant to speak to the girl in the white dress; then she saw that Mabel Thorn was coming down the aisle. She took the next seat.

"Are you not afraid of the candles?" whispered Sarah.

"What candles?"

"Those, up there. They will drip on us."

Mabel tilted her head and looked up. Then she grinned.

"Did you never hear of gas?" she asked.

"Stove gas," answered Sarah. "Our stove makes it when the wind is not right."

"You never heard of illuminating gas?"

Sarah shook her head. "Never."

"Where do you come from?"

"Near Spring Grove post-office."

"Well, the candles won't hurt you," laughed Mabel.

She got up and went across to the next row of seats to where the girl in white was sitting, and whispered to her, and they both turned and looked at Sarah. Then she came back to her place, as the chapel began to fill, and whispered to the girl on the other side, and she looked at Sarah and laughed. Sarah became slowly aware that she had said something very foolish.

Mabel did not wait for her when chapel was over, nor did she and Ellen appear until bed-time. Sarah had sat for a long time staring across the moonlit campus, and waiting to ask which bed she should take. There were a double and a single bed side by side. She supposed that the two friends would wish to sleep together, but she did not know. Once she heard the doleful strains of "Home, Sweet Home," played on a mouth organ, and some one called, "Have mercy on the new students!" and there was a burst of laughter.

When Mabel and Ellen finally arrived, they told her that she was to have the single bed. She supposed that now they would put the room in order. Well, she would cover her head from the light, and be thankful. But they undressed and tumbled into bed, even before Sarah was ready, without touching anything except the articles which were in their way. In a suspiciously short time, they were asleep.

Sarah lifted the clothes from the single bed and laid them on the chairs, then she attempted to blow out the light. Mabel was wide awake in an instant.

"Turn it off there at the wall, you goose!" she said; and was at once apparently asleep.

Sarah made her way warily toward her bed. Having said her prayers, she laid back the covers and jumped in.

Instantly there was a terrific crash, and she went down with spring and mattress to the floor. She was for the first second too terrified to breathe, then she picked herself up and found that she was not hurt. There was a faint light coming in through the transom, and she could see that the slats which supported the springs had become misplaced. With a little help, she could readjust them.

"Ach, would you please help me a little?" she begged.

There was no response from the double bed. Instead there came a heavy knock at the door.

"Who is out?" asked Sarah faintly. If the principal himself had replied, she would not have been surprised.

A stern "Let me in!" answered her. She drew her dress on over her nightgown and went to the door. A strange figure stood without,—a tall woman in a long, flowered dressing-gown.

"What was that noise?"

Sarah pointed to the bed. "I—I didn't know it would go—go down."

"Where are your room-mates?"

Mabel and Ellen evidently thought it was time to manifest signs of life.

"Here, Miss Jones."

"Can you explain this?"

"Oh, no, we were asleep. Weren't we, Sarah?"

"It just went down," stammered Sarah. "I—I guess I jumped too hard on it."

"What is your name?"

It was the first time the Wenner name had ever been mentioned with hesitation and shame.

"Sarah Wenner."

The tall figure was gone, its silent departure worse than threats, and Sarah closed the door. Mabel turned over lazily.

"Get up and help her fix the bed, Ellen, I saved her from blowing out the light."

Ellen rose, grumbling. Miss Jones lived beneath them and was the strictest teacher in the school, she said. Sarah would be haled to the office to-morrow. She helped to put the slats in place, and told Sarah not to make any more noise. Then, long after exhausted and terrified Sarah had fallen asleep, she giggled with Mabel until the night-watchman rapped at the door. That, mercifully, Sarah did not hear.

CHAPTER III SARAH LOSES HER TEMPER

When Sarah opened her eyes, early the next morning, it was scarcely more than light. She was accustomed to spring out of bed before she was fully awake; there had been very little time in her life for the last, delicious nap of early morning. There was always the stock to be fed, the cows to be milked, and the milk to be taken to the creamery, and afterwards the twins to be roused and fed and sent to school. Since Laura's advent, life had been vastly easier, but the feeling of responsibility had not altogether vanished from Sarah's mind.

There was something about the happenings of the night before that sent her hurrying out of bed as she hurried when the fear of Uncle Daniel hung over her, when she used to get up before daybreak to assure herself that the twins and Albert and the farm property were all safely in place.

She could not at first make out where she was; then the prodigious chaos of the room recalled yesterday's experiences. And here was her own bed, pushed out a little from the wall, its covers all awry. She remembered now distinctly what had happened last night.

Ellen and Mabel slept peacefully in their double bed; and as she remembered her sudden downfall and their lack of sympathy, her face flushed. Snatches of their whispered talk, heard in drowsiness, came back to her, and she began slowly to guess that it was neither the carelessness of the school bedmakers nor her own light weight which had sent the spring and mattress tumbling to the floor. She felt a pang of fright as she remembered the stern teacher in the flowered gown. But surely, they would not punish her for an accident! Presently a faint smile lifted the corners of her mouth. There was no doubt that it had been funny. But the girls might have waited until she was a little more at home.

When she was dressed she sat down by the window. There was not a soul to be seen on the quiet campus, and not a sound to be heard. It was almost six o'clock, and she began to be hungry. She had forgotten to ask the breakfast hour.

After a while there were faint noises, the opening of a distant door, the sound of sweeping down on the walks, and then the ringing of a great hand-bell. Sarah heard it first in a far corner of the building, then it drew nearer and nearer, and she heard the swift steps of Eugene, who carried it. As it went past the door, she put her hands over her ears. She smiled again, thinking that a bell like that might wake even Albert and the twins.

She began to be a little alarmed when she saw that neither Ellen nor Mabel stirred. She thought that Mabel's eyes opened, but they closed again at once. Had the girls grown suddenly deaf, or were they ill? Sarah tiptoed toward the bed and stared at them. Both were breathing regularly. But it was time to get up, and they would not wish to be late for breakfast. Sarah laid her hand on Ellen's shoulder.

"Stand up. It belled. Ach!" No, thank fortune, they had not heard. Sarah took a deep breath and amended her speech. "The bell rang," she called. "It is time to get up."

Still Ellen did not respond, and she went to the other side of the bed and tried to rouse Mabel.

"It is time to get up!"

A sleepy and cross "What?" answered her.

"The bell rang. It is time to get up."

Mabel turned over on her other side.

"Let me be."

Once more Sarah sat down by the window. Why did these girls not wish to get up? Didn't they wish any breakfast? Didn't one have to get up? Perhaps they were like the twins, who were cross at first but grateful afterwards. She touched Ellen once more.

"It is time to get up."

Ellen sat up in bed.

"If you don't be quiet and stop bothering me I'll settle you. You needn't tell me when it's time to get up. I've been in this school for a year." With that she lay down again.

Once more Sarah sat down by the window. The great building was astir now. She heard doors open and shut, she heard girl call to girl, she heard Miss Ellingwood moving round in her bedroom, and still her room-mates slept. Then an electric bell rang, and motion and sound increased. Sarah started toward the door. She would inquire whether that was the signal for breakfast, and she would go down. But a sharp voice stopped her.

Ellen and Mabel had sprung out of bed as though tossed by springs.

"Sarah," commanded Mabel, "run down the hall and fill this pitcher."

A look of distress came into Sarah's black eyes.

"I am afraid I will be late."

"Nonsense! Hurry."

Sarah flew down the hall. She met a score of girls going toward the elevator, and they looked at her smilingly.

"You'd better hurry, youngster."

"Ach, I am!" answered Sarah.

To her amazement Ellen and Mabel were almost dressed when she returned. She would have set the pitcher down inside the door and then run, but Mabel called again.

"Wait a minute. You're too late now to get in without permission, and you don't know where to go for that. See whether you can find a blue belt in that pile."

Sarah's tears dropped upon the pile of collars and ties and belts.

"I would rather not go than be late," she said.

The girls laughed. Mabel took the belt from her hand and hung it over her arm, meaning to buckle it as she ran.

"All right, you little goose," she said; and then the door closed behind them with a slam.

Sarah was desperately frightened. Perhaps they called a roll and the absentees were punished. There was no one in sight in the hall from whom she could ask advice, and she began wearily to make her bed.

"Perhaps I will have to pack my trunk, too," she said to herself. "But if I do not know what to do and nobody will tell me, how shall I find out?"

She felt a thrill of both terror and relief when she heard a footstep in the hall. It came directly to the door, there was a rap, then the door was pushed open.

"Why, Sarah, don't you want any breakfast?"

Sarah made a brave effort to steady her voice.

"Yes, ma'am."

"Then why don't you come down?"

"I—I was too late," stammered Sarah.

"Well, come now, and to-morrow morning you will begin a little earlier." Miss Ellingwood held out a kindly hand. "Won't you?"

Sarah stammered another "Yes, ma'am." She could not say that she had been up since five o'clock, because that would involve explanation, and she did not wish to be a tale-bearer.

She caught Ellen Ritter's eye as they went down between the long lines of tables, and Ellen grinned and nudged Mabel. But Sarah did not care. Some one was interested in her. Miss Ellingwood had left her breakfast and had come all the way upstairs to find her. She ate her breakfast cheerfully, answering shyly the remarks of her companions.

"Now, when the next bell rings, you must go to the chapel," said Miss Ellingwood. "Take a tablet and pencil with you, and then you can write down your classes for the day. And if you get into any difficulty, come to me. The bell will ring at eight o'clock, and you know where the chapel is."

At half-past seven Sarah took her tablet and two neatly sharpened lead pencils, and stole out of her room. Nobody should prevent her from being on time now. She went down quietly and opened the chapel door. Then she realized that she had forgotten the number of her seat. If she had such difficulty with little things, what would she do when lessons began?

Suddenly she remembered with a throb of relief the chandelier whose dripping she had feared. She sat down in a chair which was, as nearly as she could guess, the one she had occupied the night before, and bent her head back to look up. Yes, it was from this spot that she had seen the dangerous candles. She sighed thankfully, and proceeded to write her name on her note-books, and then to read the school catalogue, which gave a list of her lessons.

There would be Physiology, Arithmetic, Spelling, and Political Geography, to begin with. In each of these she would have three recitations a week, and she must pass an examination in them before the State Board at the end of the year in order to enter the Junior class. Besides, she would have less frequent lessons in Latin, History, and Grammar. In these branches she would not have to be examined, except by her teachers, until the end of her Junior year. Each week she would also have an hour's exercise in drawing and in vocal music. And every other day she would have to spend three quarters of an hour in the gymnasium. Sarah shook her head solemnly. It seemed like a large contract for so small a girl.

All the morning she went to classes, gaining in each room a new book, a new note on her tablet, and a redder flush on her cheeks. By noon the pile of books had grown almost to her chin. She carried them proudly across the campus and up to her room.

It was going to be hard, but not as hard as she had feared. She had naturally a quick mind, far quicker than she suspected. There were two branches in which she had a valuable advantage. Political Geography would be only a review. Her father had been a dreamer, loving accounts of strange cities and far countries, and in the long evenings after he had become ill, he and Sarah had pored over the atlas, following William on his long journey, and trying to picture the strange countries on the other side of the world. There were few countries which Sarah could not bound, few rivers and cities which she could not locate.

Nor would Spelling be hard. The Wenners were naturally good spellers; even little Albert could spell simple words like "cat" and "dog."

But there were Physiology and Arithmetic and History. The History had already given her a bad fright.

Professor Minturn, opening the course with a lecture on the interest and value of historical study, had suddenly looked about the class to find some one to read a paragraph from the text-book illustrating what he was saying. Sarah's face, bent eagerly forward, attracted him, and he asked her her name and told her to read. The color flamed into her cheeks, and with trembling hands she found her place in the book, and then rose. Instead of standing still, she walked to the front of the room, and, in a fashion learned before Laura had come to teach the Spring Grove School, "toed" carefully a crack in the floor, lifted her book to a level with her chin, and began.

"Page three, chapter one, paragraph four. 'The Study of History.'"

Wild laughter interrupted her, at which Professor Minturn frowned and sternly commanded silence. He was a nervous, easily irritated man, who never felt that his students worked hard enough.

"Go on, Miss Wenner."

Sarah read through the paragraph with a voice which she strenuously endeavored to make steady. It seemed to her that she had never seen so many th's and v's, which she was just learning to pronounce. But she got safely to the end, and then fled to her seat.

"I have never heard a paragraph read more intelligently," commented Professor Minturn grimly, thereby adding to her confusion.

Of all her lessons, Latin promised to be the most terrible.

"I will not talk to the twins again about learning them Latin," she said to herself, with a sigh. "But the teacher, he seems like a kind man. Perhaps he will help me sometimes a little."