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+The Project Gutenberg eBook, Molly Brown's College Friends, by Nell Speed
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: Molly Brown's College Friends
+
+
+Author: Nell Speed
+
+
+
+Release Date: July 14, 2011  [eBook #36733]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MOLLY BROWN'S COLLEGE FRIENDS***
+
+
+E-text prepared by Stephen Hutcheson, Rod Crawford, Dave Morgan, eagkw,
+and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net)
+
+
+
+Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
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+      See 36733-h.htm or 36733-h.zip:
+      (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/36733/36733-h/36733-h.htm)
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+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: She blew in at nightfall with a huge suit-case.
+(_Frontis_)                 (_Molly Brown's College Friends_)]
+
+
+MOLLY BROWN'S COLLEGE FRIENDS
+
+by
+
+NELL SPEED
+
+Author of
+"The Tucker Twins Series," "The Carter
+Girls Series," etc.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+A. L. Burt Company
+Publishers      New York
+Printed in U. S. A.
+
+Copyright, 1921
+By
+Hurst & Company
+
+Printed in the U. S. A.
+
+
+
+
+Contents
+
+
+      I.  NANCE OLDHAM                                       7
+
+     II.  BY THE FIRELIGHT                                  21
+
+    III.  THE WOULD-BE'S                                    37
+
+     IV.  FAIRY GODMOTHERS WANTED                           43
+
+      V.  THE CRITICS                                       67
+
+     VI.  "I HAD A LITTLE HUSBAND NO BIGGER THAN MY THUMB"  75
+
+    VII.  NANCE PACKS HER TRUNK                             93
+
+   VIII.  A DAMP COAT                                      102
+
+     IX.  PLANS                                            115
+
+      X.  ALL THE OLD GIRLS                                122
+
+     XI.  AN INTERESTING COUPLE                            139
+
+    XII.  AN OLD-TIME PARTY                                150
+
+   XIII.  ADVENTURE                                        162
+
+    XIV.  AS SEEN FROM THE SUMMER-HOUSE                    172
+
+     XV.  THE PROFESSOR AT A KIMONO PARTY                  177
+
+    XVI.  WAR RELIEF                                       187
+
+   XVII.  TILL DEATH DOTH US PART                          201
+
+  XVIII.  THE PUNISHMENT OF MILDRED                        216
+
+    XIX.  A DEATH                                          222
+
+     XX.  GERMS                                            234
+
+    XXI.  HER FATHER'S OWN DAUGHTER                        244
+
+   XXII.  THE ARREST                                       260
+
+  XXIII.  THEY ALSO SERVE                                  272
+
+   XXIV.  THE TRENCHES                                     284
+
+
+
+
+Molly Brown's College Friends
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+NANCE OLDHAM
+
+
+"I am so afraid Nance will be changed," sighed Molly as she put the
+finishing touches to the room her old friend was to occupy.
+
+"I'll wager anything she is the same old Nance Oldham," insisted
+Professor Green, obediently mounting the ladder to hang the last snowy
+curtain at the broad, deep window in the guest chamber overlooking the
+campus. "I think she is the kind of girl who will always be the same.
+Is that straight?"
+
+"A little bit lower at this end--there! What a comfort you are, Edwin!"
+and Molly viewed the effect approvingly.
+
+"Pretty good general houseworker, eh?" and the dignified professor of
+English at Wellington College ran nimbly down the ladder and hugged his
+wife. She submitted with very good grace to his embraces in spite of the
+fact that the fresh bureau scarves and table covers with which she was
+preparing to decorate her old friend's room were included in the
+demonstration of affection.
+
+Professor Edwin Green always declared that he never expected to catch
+up on all the years he had loved Molly Brown and had been forced to let
+"concealment like a worm in the bud feed on his damask cheek." He and
+Molly had been married almost four years on that day in March when he
+was assisting in the imposing rite of hanging curtains in the guest
+chamber, and she was still as wonderful to him as she had been on that
+day they had walked through the Forest of Fontainebleau and he had
+confessed his love. She was the same charming girl who had lingered too
+long in the cloisters and been locked in to be rescued by him on her
+first day at college, now so many years ago.
+
+Indeed, Molly Brown has changed very little since last we saw her.
+Little Mildred is walking and talking and singing little tunes and
+saying Mother Goose rhymes. She even knows her letters upside down and
+no other way, having learned them from blocks, presumably standing on
+her curly head as she acquired the knowledge.
+
+There is another baby in the nursery now: little Dodo, whose real name
+is George, a remarkably satisfactory infant who sleeps when he should
+and wakes in a good humor, taking the proper nourishment at the proper
+hours and going back to sleep. Molly had learned the great secret of
+young motherhood from her first born: not to take parenthood too
+solemnly and seriously, and to realize that Mother Nature is the very
+best mother of all and babies thrive most when left as much as possible
+to her all-wise and tender care.
+
+Nance Oldham, Molly's old friend and roommate at college, was coming at
+last to make her long promised visit to the Greens. Little wonder that
+Molly feared she would be changed! Nance's path in life had not been
+strewn with roses. No doubt my readers will remember that Mrs. Oldham,
+her mother, was a clever woman, lecturer, suffrage agitator, anything
+but a homemaker. When Nance finished college she had gone back to
+Vermont and dutifully kept house for her neglected father, although her
+secret ambition was to teach. Mr. Oldham had been so happy in having a
+home of his own that Nance had felt fully repaid for her sacrifice. Her
+mother, too, had at last realized the delights of home, when someone
+else had the trouble of keeping it, and had spent much more time with
+her family than she had for many years.
+
+A lingering illness had attacked Mr. Oldham and after two years of
+tender nursing on the part of his daughter and futile ineffectual
+attempts at tenderness on the part of his wife, the poor man had passed
+away. Then it was that Nance's friends had felt that her career might
+begin, but Mrs. Oldham had suddenly decided that she could not live
+without the husband who had been ever patient with her vagaries and she
+had gone into a slow decline. More nursing and self-denial for the
+patient Nance!
+
+She was an orphan now and although she was in reality little more than
+a girl she felt old and settled, that the little youth she had ever had,
+had left her years ago. Molly had written her immediately on hearing of
+Mrs. Oldham's death, declaring that she and her Edwin were ready and
+eager for the long-deferred visit. "I say 'visit,'" wrote Molly, "but I
+want you to make your home with us. Little Mildred calls you Aunt Nance
+and Dodo will call you the same as soon as he can talk."
+
+The guest chamber was now in perfect order. The fresh curtains hung as
+straight as a learned professor of English could hang them, the bureau
+scarf and table cover were smooth and spotless, and on the window sill
+blossomed a pot of sweet violets sent by Mrs. McLean from her own
+greenhouse.
+
+"I wonder about Nance and Andy McLean," said Molly, as she and her
+husband were walking to the station to meet their guest.
+
+"Wonder what about them?"
+
+"Wonder if they will ever marry!"
+
+"Pooh! I fancy it was just a schoolgirl affair. They don't often amount
+to much."
+
+"Schoolgirl affairs can be right serious, as you of all others should
+know!"
+
+"Thank goodness, some of them!" said Edwin devoutly.
+
+"I reckon Nance will be in deep mourning," sighed Molly. "I hate
+mourning,--I mean long veils and crepe trimmings."
+
+"So do I,--a relic of barbarism!"
+
+"I'll give up my literary club for a while. I know Nance will not feel
+like seeing a lot of young people."
+
+Professor Green said nothing but he felt it was rather hard on
+Wellington that any of its pleasures should be curtailed because of the
+death of a lady in Vermont. But Molly must do what she thought best. He
+hoped their guest would not put too long a face on life and would not
+prove inconsolable.
+
+The long train stopped at the little station at Wellington and Molly
+and her husband eagerly scanned the few passengers who alighted from the
+Pullman. One lady in a long crepe veil got an embrace from the impulsive
+Molly but she turned out to be an utter stranger and not the beloved
+Nance.
+
+"She didn't come!" cried Molly.
+
+"Oh yes, she did, but she came on a day coach," and there was Nance
+hugging Molly and shaking hands with Professor Green at the same time.
+
+That gentleman was viewing his wife's old friend with great
+satisfaction. Instead of the long crepe veil and the lugubrious
+black-clothed figure, here was a slight young woman in a neat brown suit
+and furs, with a close brown velvet toque and a chic little dotted brown
+veil.
+
+"Nance! I was expecting----"
+
+"Of course you were expecting to find me swathed in black. I am doing
+what Mother asked me to do. She hated mourning and so did Father and I
+am a fright in black and it would have meant a new outfit, which I can
+ill afford, and so----"
+
+"And so you are a sensible girl," said Professor Green approvingly, as
+he took possession of her traveling bag and trunk check.
+
+"Oh, Nance, you are not changed one bit!" cried Molly.
+
+"You are changed a lot," said the truthful Nance, "but you are more
+beautiful. In fact, you never were really beautiful before, but now,
+now----"
+
+"Oh, spare my blushes!" cried Molly, who did not spare herself but
+blushed and blushed and blushed again.
+
+Nance was the same little brown-eyed person with the same honest look
+out of those eyes. In repose her mouth did have a slight droop at the
+corners but otherwise she might have been a college girl still, so
+youthful were her lines and so clear and rosy her healthy skin. Her hair
+was as Molly had always remembered it, smooth and glossy with much
+brushing and every lock in place.
+
+"Are you tired, honey? If you are, we can go home in the bus," suggested
+Molly. "Look what a fine motor bus we have now! Do you remember the old
+yellow one with the lame horses?"
+
+"Do I? And also that I met you right at this station when we were both
+freshmen and we rode up in that bus together. Oh, Molly, it is wonderful
+to be here with you! No, I'm not tired, so let's walk."
+
+The professor was due for lectures and the girls left him without
+reluctance. Even husbands were superfluous when such old friends met
+after being separated for so many years. There was so much to talk
+about, so many loose threads to catch up, so much belated news that had
+not seemed important enough to write.
+
+"I'm dying to see the children."
+
+"They are lovely! There is Mildred now waving to us from your window. I
+wonder what she is doing in there. I do hope she has not got into
+mischief," said Molly uneasily.
+
+The guest chamber was still spotless and Molly breathed a sigh of
+relief. She had had visions of the irrepressible Mildred's making dolly
+sheets of the bureau scarf or of putting her black kitten to sleep in
+the snowy bed. The chubby imp was standing with her back to the window,
+her hands behind her. Her golden curls made a halo around her charming
+face, her brown eyes were soft and dreamy and her rosebud mouth looked
+as though butter would not melt in it.
+
+"Come, darling, and speak to Aunt Nance," said Molly.
+
+"Ain't no Aunt Nance!"
+
+"Mildred!"
+
+"Never mind, Molly! Don't force her. She and I will end by being
+sweethearts, I am sure," said Nance laughing.
+
+"Never mind, Dodo will be your sweetheart now," declared Molly, going
+through all the agony of motherhood when the offspring refuses to be
+polite. "You may go to Katy, Mildred," in a tone as severe as she could
+make it.
+
+Mildred sidled around, carefully keeping her back to her mother.
+
+"What have you in your hand, darling?"
+
+"Fings!"
+
+"What things?"
+
+"I been a-tuttin'."
+
+"Scissors! Oh, Mildred, you know how afraid your mother is for you to
+play with scissors! What am I to do with you?"
+
+Mildred made a sudden resolution. Why not throw herself on the mercy of
+this new aunt for protection. She darted by her mother and sprang into
+the ready arms of Nance.
+
+"I been a-tuttin' a bunch of vi'lets for my Aunt Nance--an' I been
+a-fwingin' her curtains all pretty for her."
+
+In one hand she had tightly clasped a huge pair of shears and in the
+other the violets which she had ruthlessly culled from the pot sent by
+Mrs. McLean.
+
+"Oh, Mildred, see what you have done," agonized Molly. "Mrs. McLean sent
+them to you, Nance. I am so sorry they are spoiled."
+
+"But they are not," declared Nance, trying to keep down the blush that
+would come at the knowledge that Andy McLean's mother had shown her
+this attention. "We can put this dear little bunch in water, and I am
+sure there are many more buds to bloom. Let's see, Mildred."
+
+"'Deed they is! I wouldn't cut no li'l baby buds off for nothin' or
+nothin'. 'Tain't no bad Milly in this house."
+
+"But the curtains!" wailed poor Molly when she viewed the neat fringes
+that her daughter had so carefully slashed with the great shears.
+
+"Now don't worry about that," insisted Nance. "Mildred and I are going
+to cut them off and hem them up. Aren't we, Mildred? Very short curtains
+are all the style now, anyhow."
+
+"Yes!" exclaimed the wily Mildred eagerly, "the windows likes to show
+they silk stockings, jes' like the ladies."
+
+"Oh, you darling!" cried Nance, sinking down and holding the child in
+her arms, while Molly rescued the long and dangerous shears.
+
+"Now, Muvver, you needn't to worry no mo', Aunt Nance an' I is done
+made up an' I done forgive her an' all."
+
+"But how about you! Who has forgiven you?"
+
+"Me! I done forgive myself 'long with Aunt Nance. I say right easy way
+down inside me: 'Milly, 'scuse me!' An' then way down inside me say mos'
+politeful: 'You's 'scusable, darlin' chil'.'"
+
+"Molly, how can you resist her?" asked Nance.
+
+"Well, I don't reckon I can," said Molly, whimsically. "But you won't do
+it any more, will you, Mildred?"
+
+"No'm, never in my world--cross my heart an' wish I may die--bake a
+puddin' bake a pie did you ever tell a lie yes you did you know you did
+you broke yo' mammy's teapot lid."
+
+"Some of Kizzie's nonsense!" laughed Molly, remembering in her childhood
+saying exactly the same thing.
+
+And so Nance Oldham was received into the home of the Edwin Greens.
+Already she had won the approval of the master by appearing in colors
+and not swathed in black (men always do hate mourning). Mildred had
+decided to love and honor and make her obey. Little Dodo soon accepted
+her lap as an especially nice place to spend his few waking moments, and
+Molly's love and welcome were assured from the beginning of time.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+BY THE FIRELIGHT
+
+
+The only home Nance Oldham had ever known she had made herself after
+she left college. Her childhood and girlhood had been spent in boarding
+houses with her patient father, while her brilliant mother made
+occasional hurried and preoccupied visits to them. There had been a
+time when Nance had felt bitterly towards her mother because she was
+not as other mothers were, but the realization had finally come to her
+that her mother could no more be as other mothers than other mothers
+could be as Mrs. Oldham was. She had decided that instead of her
+mother's being a mistake, that she, Nance, was the mistake. She should
+never have been born; but now that she was born she intended to make
+the best of it. The fact that she had never had a home made a home
+just that much more precious and desirable in her eyes.
+
+What a lovely home this square old brick house on the campus made!
+Nance remembered well in her college days that it was not such a very
+attractive place, rather bleak, in fact. It needed a mistress, the soul
+of a house; and now in place of the blank uncurtained windows of old
+days, Molly's genial hospitality and kindness seemed to look out from
+every pane of glass. The college girls named Mrs. Edwin Green "The Fairy
+Godmother of Wellington." She was called into consultation on every
+occasion. The President of Wellington wondered if it were not incumbent
+upon her to offer Molly a salary for her services.
+
+"I don't know what we would do without her. I believe the college would
+simply go to pieces without Mrs. Edwin Green."
+
+The students, old and young, rich and poor, flocked to the brick house
+which they dubbed "The Square Deal." There Molly administered advice
+and love and sympathy with absolute impartiality, also with perfect
+unconsciousness that she was the guiding star of the student body.
+
+"She is the only really truly democratic person I ever knew,--of
+course, besides O. Henry, and I didn't exactly know him," Billie McKym
+declared. "She and O. Henry simply don't regard money one way or the
+other in their judgment of persons. Now most social workers think of the
+rich as necessary evils in the way of pocketbooks and such. They really
+take no interest in anyone who does not need financial or moral help,
+but Molly and O. Henry are just as good to the rich as the poor."
+
+Billie was back at Wellington taking extra courses that she wasn't
+certain what she was to do with, but she felt anything was preferable to
+coming out into society in New York, which was the inevitable sequence
+the moment she was through with college.
+
+Billie rather resented the guest at the Square Deal as did many of
+Molly's youthful friends.
+
+"There's never any seeing Molly alone now," she grumbled.
+
+"Never!" agreed Mary Neil, a red-headed junior who had what she termed
+a "mash" on Mrs. Green. Molly, being totally unaware of this, was ever
+causing the poor girl to turn green with jealousy.
+
+"To think of her stopping the 'Would-be's' just because Miss Oldham's
+mother died, and she didn't even think enough of her to put on
+mourning," asserted Lilian Swift as she peeped in the mirror over the
+mantel to adjust her own very becoming black and white hat, worn as
+second mourning for a great-aunt who had left her a legacy.
+
+These girls were assembled in the library at the Greens', waiting to see
+their friend. That evening the "Would-be Authors' Club" was to have met,
+but Molly, their president, had felt it best to postpone it because of
+Nance's recent bereavement. The "Would-be Authors" was now a flourishing
+organization with a waiting list that almost stretched around the
+campus. They met together for mutual benefit and encouragement and
+sometimes for discouragement. The only requisite for membership was to
+scribble at fiction. On coming into this club it was necessary to pledge
+oneself to take a criticism like a man. No matter how severe a drubbing
+your story called forth, you must smile and smile.
+
+"Girls, I'm so sorry to keep you waiting, but Mildred had got
+chewing-gum in her hair and I simply had to get it out before her whole
+wig stuck together," said Molly as she came in with Dodo in her arms and
+Mildred trotting after her like a veritable little colt following its
+dam. "My friend, Miss Oldham, will be down in a moment."
+
+The girls looked at one another meaningly.
+
+"I want all of you to like my friend," continued Molly, as though she
+could divine their thoughts. "She has had a hard time and she needs the
+companionship of young people more than anyone I know."
+
+Molly then told them of Nance's devotion to her mother and father, of
+her thwarted ambition, of her unselfishness and cleverness.
+
+"It seems strange for her not to wear mourning for her mother," said
+Lilian.
+
+"Perhaps it does, but when you think of it, what you wear has nothing to
+do with your feelings. It is in a way part of Nance's unselfishness
+that she did not put on mourning. Her father disliked it, her mother
+could not abide it, and as she said, it meant a new outfit which she
+could ill afford. It is a great deal easier just to give up to grief and
+exude gloom than it is to be cheerful and radiate light and happiness."
+
+Molly was in a measure irritated by Lilian's criticism of her beloved
+Nance, but Lilian was a person who always spoke her mind no matter what
+was involved, and she had a certain sturdiness and honesty of opinion
+that disarmed one.
+
+"Well, that's all right," she answered bluntly, "but while she is being
+so unselfish about her clothes, why doesn't she spunk up a bit about the
+'Would-be Authors?'"
+
+"What about them?"
+
+"Why, postponing the meeting because she is in such deep grief."
+
+"That wasn't Nance. I am responsible for that foolishness. She only
+found out about it to-day and declares she will go back to Vermont if I
+dare make a single change in my way of living. I want all of you to get
+messages to the club to be sure and come this evening."
+
+"Bully for Nance!" cried Billie McKym.
+
+Nance came into the room just as Billie was cheering her.
+
+"I'm mighty glad it's bully for me, if I'm the Nance. But why 'Bully for
+Nance'?"
+
+"Just because you are here with Mrs. Green and can come to our literary
+club this evening," said Billie with a straight face.
+
+"But I am no scribbler," declared Nance.
+
+"But you are a wonderful critic," said Molly. "Among so many scribblers
+it is well to have one sane person willing to compose the audience. It
+is my turn to read to-night and I want your criticism."
+
+"If I can come in that capacity, I am more than willing," smiled Nance
+as she settled herself to her knitting.
+
+"I remember many times you saved me from making a bombastic goose of
+myself on my college themes," laughed Molly. "What I flattered myself
+was pathos, under your cool judgment turned out often to be bathos."
+
+Molly leaned over and gave her friend an affectionate pat. At this show
+of love, Mary Neil jumped up so suddenly that she upset little Mildred,
+who was sitting on the sofa by her, and without saying a word rushed
+from the room.
+
+"What on earth!" exclaimed Molly.
+
+"The suddenness of Mary,--that's all," declared Billie.
+
+"Good title for a story!" said Lilian, getting out a note-book.
+
+"Oh, you scribblers!" laughed Nance.
+
+Little Mildred was picked up and comforted and in a short while the
+visitors took their departure.
+
+"Molly, do you know what was the matter with that interesting looking
+red-headed girl?" asked Nance as they settled to the delights of a
+twilight chat, while Nance busily plied her knitting needles on the long
+drab scarf that seemed to grow under her agile fingers like magic.
+
+"I have no idea."
+
+"She was jealous of me. I noticed how she looked at me when I came in
+and she never said a single word while all of us were chatting. Then the
+moment you gave me a little pat, she jumped up as though she had
+received an electric shock and fled."
+
+"Absurd! I hate to think it of Mary."
+
+"It's true all the same. Didn't you know she was crazy about you?"
+
+"No, and I don't want to know it. A girl had better be beau-crazy than
+have these silly cases with other girls. I am going to put a stop to it
+in some way."
+
+"How, may I ask?"
+
+"I might do like Peg Woffington and put my hair up in curl papers and
+appear at my very worst."
+
+"Well, dearie, your worst might be so much better than some person's
+best that that might not work. But don't think I've got a case on you."
+
+"Never! We were foolish enough college girls but we never were that
+foolish. I can't remember anyone in our crowd having these silly
+mashes. Can you?"
+
+"Unless it was the affair Judy Kean had with Adele Windsor. Do you
+remember when poor Judy turned up with her hair dyed a blue black?"
+
+"Do I?" and the friends went off into peals of laughter just as Mrs.
+McLean ushered herself into the firelit room.
+
+"The door was open so I came right in," announced that dear woman. She
+caught Nance's hands in a strong grasp and drew the girl towards her.
+"I am glad to see you, my dear," she said simply. Her well-remembered
+Scotch accent fell pleasingly on Nance's ear.
+
+"The violets were lovely. I thank you so much," faltered Nance.
+
+Molly wondered at the embarrassment of her friend. She had longed to
+talk to Nance about Andy McLean but did not know how to begin. She
+shrank from prying into her guest's affairs, but the eternal feminine
+in her was on the alert for the romance she had no doubt was there.
+
+"And now I must tell you all about Andy," said his fond mother. "I know
+you want to hear about him,--eh?"
+
+"Indeed we do," put in Molly quickly, while Nance tried to go on with
+her knitting, but I am afraid dropped more stitches than she picked up.
+
+"He has resigned from the hospital staff in New York where he was doing
+so splendidly and is to go to France as an ambulance surgeon."
+
+"Oh!" came involuntarily from Nance.
+
+"Splendid!" cried Molly.
+
+"It is what he should do," declared his Spartan mother. "His father and
+I would not have it otherwise. Of course, the States will be at war
+before the month is out and Andy might wait and enlist with his own
+country, but in the meantime he is needed, and sadly needed, by my
+country, mine and his father's."
+
+"He will come see you before he sails, will he not?" asked Molly.
+
+"Of course! He may spend a month with us."
+
+"That will be splendid indeed."
+
+Nance said nothing, but the flames that sprang from the wood fire lit up
+a very rosy countenance.
+
+"I must be going now. I only ran in for a moment to bring the news of my
+Andy and to see this little friend again. Come to see me, both of you,"
+and the doctor's wife was gone.
+
+"Molly! I should never have come to you!" said Nance the moment the door
+closed on their visitor. Katy, the Irish nurse, had come for the baby.
+Little Mildred had fallen asleep, her head in Nance's lap.
+
+"My darling girl! Why?"
+
+"I can't spoil Andy's visit to his mother. If I am here, it will be
+spoiled."
+
+"Nance, how can you say so?"
+
+"Because it is the truth. He will have to see me, and he hates me."
+
+"He couldn't!"
+
+"He left me two years ago in a rage and swore it was over for good and
+all; and he couldn't have said such things to me if he had not hated
+me."
+
+"And you--do you hate him?"
+
+"Of course not!" and again the flickering fire showed off her blushes.
+
+"Did you say nothing to him but nice things?"
+
+"We-ll, not exactly,--but he said the things he said first."
+
+"Were the things he said worse than the things you said?"
+
+"No!" with a toss of her independent head, "I gave him back as good as
+he sent."
+
+"You shouldn't have done it. You knew how the things he said hurt, and
+with your superior knowledge of what it meant to be wounded, you were
+cruel to hurt him so."
+
+"But he should have known! That kind of philosophy is above me. Suppose
+the Allies conducted their warfare under those principles, what would
+become of us? Germany hit first and France and Belgium knew how it hurt,
+and so they should not have hit back. There is a big hole in your
+reasoning, honey."
+
+"But that is not the same. Germany and France didn't love one another,
+while you and Andy----"
+
+"Well, it is all over now!" and Nance composed herself and tried to go
+on with her knitting. Molly thought in her heart perhaps it was not so
+"over" as Nance thought.
+
+"Why did you and Andy quarrel?"
+
+"I had promised when Father no longer needed me that I
+would--would--marry him. How could I tell that Mother would want to
+come live with me when poor Father was gone? Andy came as soon as he
+learned of Father's death and seemed to think I could pick right up
+and marry him, and when I objected to such unseemly haste he said I
+had been flirting with him. The idea of such a thing! He got it into
+his head that Dr. Flint, the physician who had been with us through
+poor Father's long illness, was the cause of my holding back."
+
+"A young doctor?"
+
+"Ye-es!"
+
+"Was he--was he--attentive?"
+
+"Perhaps--well, yes--he did propose to me but I had no idea of
+accepting him. Andy should have known me well enough to realize that I
+couldn't be so low as to jilt him. When Andy came, Mother had just told
+me that she never expected to leave me again. I never did have a chance
+to tell this to him, he was so angry and so jealous. He wanted me to
+marry him immediately and leave Vermont,--and how could I when Mother
+was home, sick and miserable and reproaching herself for having been
+away from Father so much?"
+
+"Did your mother not know of your engagement to Andy?"
+
+"No-o! You see, poor Mother was not--was not the kind of mother one
+confided in much. Afterwards, when I nursed her through all those
+months, she was so softened if I had had anything to confide I should
+have done so, but then there was nothing left to confide."
+
+"Poor old Nance!" said Molly lovingly.
+
+"Well, I'm not sorry for myself a bit. No doubt I might have gone
+whining to Andy and made him take back all the things he said, but I am
+no whiner. It was a good thing we found out in time we could say such
+things to each other!"
+
+"Maybe it was a good thing to find out in time how it hurt to say such
+things and have such things said to one, and then it would never happen
+again," said the hopeful Molly.
+
+Nance divined that Molly was thinking how best she could bring these two
+estranged lovers together, and determined to frustrate any matchmaking
+plans the young matron might be hatching.
+
+"Promise me, Molly, you will not say a thing to Andy or to anyone. It is
+something that is hopelessly mixed up and my pride would never recover
+if Andy should know that I cared."
+
+"You do care then?"
+
+"Of course I care! I never had very many friends and if I cared for Andy
+enough to engage myself to him, I could not get over it ever, I am
+afraid. But you have not promised yet."
+
+"I promise," said Molly sadly. "But if you love Andy, it does seem so
+foolish----"
+
+"But remember you have promised!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+THE WOULD-BE'S
+
+
+What a chattering there was as the crowd of girls gathered for the
+weekly meeting of their literary club! Professor Green beat a hasty
+retreat from the library. He declared that listening to schoolgirl
+fiction was no treat to him. Besides there was so much to be read
+concerning the war in that month of March, 1917, and little time in
+which to read it. War was an obsession with Edwin Green. Waking and
+sleeping it was ever with him. He regretted his being unable to enlist
+as a private in the French army, so strong were his sympathies with
+that struggling nation. Certain that his country would finally drop its
+neutrality and come out strongly for democracy and the Allies, he could
+hardly wait for the final declaration of war. He had his den, safe from
+the encroachments of the "Would-be Authors' Club," and there he
+ensconced himself with enough newspapers and magazines to furnish
+reading matter for the whole of Wellington.
+
+The rules of the club were as follows: Two pieces of original fiction
+must be read at each meeting. A chairman for the evening must be
+appointed by the two performers. All manuscript must be written legibly
+if not typewritten, so that the club need not have to wait while the
+author tried to read her own writing. Criticism must be given and taken
+in good humor and good faith.
+
+Molly, in forming this club, had endeavored to have in it only those
+students who were really interested in short story writing and ambitious
+to perfect themselves, but in spite of her ideals there were some
+members who were in it for the fun they got out of it or for a certain
+prestige they fancied they would gain from these weekly meetings at the
+home of the popular wife of a popular professor. These slackers were
+constantly bringing excuses for plots when their time came to read, or
+trying to work off on the club old essays and theses on various subjects
+not in the least related to fiction.
+
+"You are to read this evening, I believe, Mary," said Molly to Mary Neil
+as the library filled. "You missed last time and so got put on this
+week."
+
+"Yes--I--that is--you see, I sat up all night trying to finish a story
+but couldn't get it to suit me."
+
+"Did you bring it?"
+
+"Oh no, it was too much in the rough."
+
+"That's too bad, Mary!" cried Lilian Swift. "There are plenty of us who
+had things to read and you cut us out of the chance."
+
+"Surely some of you must have brought things," said Molly, trying not to
+smile, knowing full well that in almost every pocket of the really and
+truly "Would-be's" some gem of purest ray serene in the shape of a
+manuscript was only waiting to be dived for. The self-conscious
+expression on at least a dozen faces put her mind at rest in regard to
+the program of the evening.
+
+"It seems I have the appointing of a chairman for the meeting in my
+power, since the other reader has fallen out of the running," said
+Molly, looking as severely as she could look at the sullen, handsome
+Mary Neil, "so I appoint Billie McKym."
+
+Billie, a most ardent scribbler, had been drawn into the procession of
+short-story fiends by her dear friend Thelma Larson, who was destined to
+become famous as a writer of fiction. Billie had no great talent but she
+possessed a fresh breezy line of dialogue that covered a multitude of
+sins in the way of plot formation, motivation, crisis, climax and what
+not.
+
+"Remember, Billie, the chair is not the floor," teased one of the
+members.
+
+Billie was a great talker and although she was no pronounced success as
+a writer of fiction, she was a good critic of the performance of others.
+
+"Just for that I'll ask you, Miss Smarty, to serve as vice, and when I
+have something important to say I'll put you in the chair for keeps."
+
+"Oh, let Mrs. Green begin and stop squabbling," demanded a girl who had
+a plot she was dying to divulge and devoutly hoped she would be called
+on when their hostess got through.
+
+"Then begin!" and Billie rapped for order.
+
+Molly took her seat by the reading-lamp and opened her manuscript.
+Having to read before the club was just as exciting to Molly as to the
+veriest freshman. Her cheeks flushed and her hand trembled a wee bit.
+
+"Silly of me to get stage fright but I can't help it," she laughed.
+
+"How do you reckon we feel then?" drawled a little girl from Alabama,
+who only the week before had been torn limb from limb by the relentless
+"Would-be's."
+
+"This is a story that I have sent on many a journey and it always comes
+back to its doting mother. I have received several personal letters
+about it----"
+
+"Oh, wonderful!" came from several members.
+
+"Only think, the most encouraging thing that has happened to me yet was
+once a Western magazine kept my manuscript almost three weeks," sighed
+a willowy maiden.
+
+"Now please criticize it just as severely as you can. I want to sell it,
+and something must be done to it before the editors will take it,"
+begged Molly, getting over her ridiculous stage fright.
+
+"Fire away!" said parliamentary Billie.
+
+"How long is it?" asked Lilian Swift.
+
+"About five thousand words, I think!"
+
+"Whew!" blew the girl who hoped to get her plot in edgewise.
+
+There was a general laugh and then Molly cleared her throat for action.
+"First, let me tell you I saw a clipping in the _New York Times_ asking
+for Fairy Godmothers for the soldiers. That was what put the idea in my
+head. The title is: 'Fairy Godmothers Wanted.'"
+
+You could have heard a pin drop while Molly read, and occasionally one
+did hear the scratching of a pencil wielded by a member who was on a
+critical war-path.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+FAIRY GODMOTHERS WANTED
+
+
+The ballroom was crowded but very quiet. The belle of the ball was the
+night nurse, deftly accomplishing the many duties that fall to the share
+of a night nurse. A letter must be written for a poor Gascon who had
+lost his right arm; a Bedouin chief must be watered every five minutes;
+a little red-headed Irishman begging for morphine to ease his pain, and
+a sad Cockney lad sobbing because he was "'omesick for 'Ammersmith,"
+must be comforted.
+
+The beautiful old chateau had been converted into a hospital early in
+the war and the _salle de bal_ was given over to the convalescents. The
+convalescent male is a very difficult proposition, and the little nurse
+sometimes felt her burden was greater than she could bear. There was so
+much to do for these sick soldiers besides nurse them. One thing, she
+must good-naturedly submit to being made love to in many different
+languages. She could stand all but the Bedouin chief.
+
+"He seems so like our darkeys at home," she had whispered to the one
+American who was getting well rather faster than he liked to admit.
+
+This American wanted to get well and be back in the trenches, but who
+was to make love to the pretty night nurse in good old American when he
+left the convalescent ward?
+
+"You promised to do something for me to-night. Don't forget! You must be
+almost through with all of these fellows."
+
+"Ready in a minute!" She flitted down between the rows of cots, tucking
+in the covers here, plumping up a pillow there. The Bedouin was watered
+for the last time that night and finally closed his rolling black eyes.
+
+"Now, what is it?" she asked, sinking down on a stool by the American's
+bed, which was placed in an alcove at one end of the great salon. "If it
+is writing a letter, thank goodness, it won't have to be in the second
+person singular in French. Why do you suppose they teach us such formal
+French at school? I can't _tutoyer_ for the life of me."
+
+"Same here! _Je t'aime_'s all I know. But I don't want you to write a
+letter for me. I want you to read some. But first I must know your
+really truly name. I--I--like you too much just to have to call you
+nurse."
+
+"Mary Grubb!"
+
+"No! Not really?"
+
+"Yes! I'd like to know what is the matter with my name. It is a
+perfectly good name, I reckon."
+
+"Yes, Mary is beautiful--but--the other! Never mind, you can change it."
+
+"I have no desire to do so, at least not for many a day. I think Grubb
+is especially nice. It suggests Sally Lunn and batter bread."
+
+"There now, I would know you are from the South even if your dear little
+'reckons' didn't come popping out every now and then. Do you know, I
+have a friend who lives in Kentucky, and when the war is over I have
+been planning to go see her, but now--but now--I am afraid she won't
+want to see me."
+
+"You mean the scars?" and she looked pityingly at the young man and put
+her firm little hand on his head. "Why, they will not amount to much.
+They will just make you look interesting. Your eyes will be well, I just
+know they will. Look at this long scar that has given the most trouble!
+It has turned to a pleasing pink and will be almost gone in a few
+months. You see you are so healthy."
+
+"It isn't altogether the scars. If you think they are pretty, maybe she
+will, too. There is something else. I want to read over all this packet
+of letters before I decide something. You had better begin or that big,
+black, bounding beggar over there will begin to whine for water again.
+After you read the letters, maybe I will tell you the other reason why
+my friend in Kentucky might not want to see me."
+
+He took from under his pillow a packet of little blue letters, tightly
+tied with a piece of twine.
+
+"Here they are! These letters have meant a lot to me while I was in the
+trenches. They still mean a lot to me. They were written by my Fairy
+Godmother."
+
+"Oh! Are they love letters?"
+
+"No, indeed! I wouldn't ask a woman to read another woman's love
+letters. I wouldn't let anyone but you read these letters, but my eyes
+are too punk to read them myself and I have to--to hear them to decide
+something, something very important."
+
+"All right! A nurse is a kind of father confessor and what one hears
+professionally is sacred."
+
+"But, my dear, I am not thinking of you as a nurse."
+
+"But I am thinking of you as a patient."
+
+She slipped the top letter from the packet and turned it over. "So your
+name is Stephen Scott!"
+
+"Didn't you know my name, either? How funny!"
+
+"I only know the names of the patients who have charts, and you are too
+well to waste a chart on. We nurses call you the convalescent American.
+Sure these are not love letters?"
+
+"Of course!" impatiently. "But if you don't want to read them to me,
+just say so. Maybe you are tired. Of course you are. You look pale and
+your little hand is trembling."
+
+"No, no! I am not tired! Let me begin."
+
+The _salle de bal_ of the old chateau was very quiet. The wounded
+soldiers were dropping off to sleep one by one. Even the Bedouin chief
+had stopped rolling his eyes and was softly snoring. In a low clear
+voice she read the letters.
+
+  MY DEAR GODSON:
+
+  It is so wonderful to be a Godmother that I can hardly contain
+  myself for joy. It is through an advertisement I saw in a New York
+  paper, headed Fairy Godmothers Wanted, that I happen to have you and
+  you happen to have me. I consider our introduction quite regular as
+  it came through the wife of a great general.
+
+  I wonder how you like belonging to me? I wonder if you are as alone
+  in the world and homeless as I am. I wonder if you are big or
+  little, dark or fair, old or young. I wonder all kinds of things
+  about you,--after all, it makes no difference, any of these things.
+  You are my Godson and every day I am going to pray for you and
+  think about you. I am going to send you presents and write you long
+  letters and send you newspapers. The only trouble about it is by the
+  time I get hold of English papers they will be weeks and weeks old.
+  I wonder if American magazines and papers would appeal to you. I
+  wonder what kind of presents you would like,--not beaded
+  antimacassars and not mouchoir cases surely. I will knit you a
+  sweater maybe, but I am not very fond of knitting.
+
+  This business of being a Fairy Godmother is a very serious one, more
+  serious than being a real mother, I believe. A real mother can at
+  least do something towards forming the character of her child, but a
+  Fairy Godmother has her child presented to her and takes it as the
+  husband used to take his bride in the old English prayer book: "With
+  all her debts and scandals upon her." The worst of it is that she is
+  ignorant what those debts and scandals are. I don't even know what
+  kind of smoke to send you. Are you middle-aged and sedate and do you
+  smoke a corn-cob pipe? Are you young and giddy and do you live on
+  cigarettes? A terrible possibility has entered into my mind! Are you
+  one of those awful persons that uses what our darkeys call "eatin'
+  tobacco"? If so, I shall begin to train you immediately.
+
+  Perhaps you want to know something about me. There is not much to
+  know. I am an orphan of independent means and character. Being the
+  first, enables me to be the second, which sounds like a riddle but
+  isn't. You see I have rafts and oodlums of kin, and if I did not
+  have an income of my own they would step in and coerce me even more
+  than they do. I said in the beginning that I was homeless. I am not
+  really that, but the trouble is I have too many homes. I must spend
+  the winter with Aunt Sally and the spring with Cousin Kate. Cousin
+  Maria and Uncle Bruce want me to take White Sulphur by storm with
+  them as chaperones; and so it is from one year's end to the other,
+  kind relations planning for me. I am bored to death with it all and
+  am even now preparing a bomb to throw in this camp of overzealous
+  kin. But I'll tell you about that later,--that is, if you want to
+  hear about it. I may be boring you stiff. If I am, it is an easy
+  matter for you to repudiate me and tell Mrs. Johnson to get you a
+  more agreeable Godmother.
+
+  My numerous family does not at all approve of my being a Godmother.
+  They think I am too young for the responsibility and have entered
+  upon it too lightly. I even heard Aunt Sally whisper to Cousin
+  Maria: "Just like her mother!" That means in their minds that I am
+  headstrong and difficult. You see my mother was also of independent
+  means and character. Also (I whisper this) she was not a Southerner.
+  That is as serious in a Southerner's eyes as not being British is in
+  yours. They think it is very forward of me to be writing to a man
+  what has not been properly introduced. Uncle Bruce suggests that you
+  may not even be born. I tell him soldiers don't have to be born and
+  that the bravest soldiers that were ever known sprang up from
+  dragon's teeth.
+
+  I am sending you as my first present all kinds of tobacco, even
+  plug. I must not let my prejudices get away with me. If my dear
+  Godson likes "eatin' tobacco," he shall have it. If you don't
+  indulge in it, give it to some soldier less dainty. For my part, I
+  should think the trenches would be dirty enough without adding to
+  them.
+
+  I want to tell you that I like your name. I think Stephen Scott
+  sounds very manly and upstanding, somehow. I am hoping for a letter
+  from you just to give me an inkling of your tastes. Of course I know
+  one of the duties of a Fairy Godmother is not to worry her charge,
+  and I don't want to worry you but to help you. I think of you in
+  those damp, nasty ditches eating all kinds of food, served in all
+  kinds of ways. (I am sure what should be hot is cold, and what
+  should be cold is hot.) And when I sit down to batter-bread and
+  fried chicken I can hardly force it down, I do so want you to have
+  it instead of me.
+
+                              Your affectionate Godmother,
+                                                 POLLY NELSON.
+
+The night nurse quietly folded up the first letter and slipped it back
+in its blue envelope. She had a whimsical, amused expression on her
+face.
+
+"What are you smiling over? Don't you think that is a nice letter?"
+
+"I didn't say it wasn't."
+
+"But you didn't say it was. I think that is a sweet letter. I tell you
+it meant a lot to me. Of course, I am not the homeless Tommy she thought
+I was. I fancy I have as many Aunt Sallies and Cousin Marias as she has,
+but they happen to be in New England."
+
+"You are not an orphan, then!"
+
+"Oh, yes! I'm an orphan all right enough, but I am related to half of
+Massachusetts and all of Boston."
+
+"Did you tell your Fairy Godmother that?"
+
+"No,--that's what makes me feel so bad. I was afraid she would stop
+being my Godmother if she found out I was--well, not exactly poor, so
+I--I didn't exactly lie----"
+
+"You didn't exactly tell the truth, either," and the night nurse curled
+her pretty lip and looked disgusted.
+
+"Oh, please don't be angry with me, too. I know she will be. I have
+simply got to tell her the truth about myself. I did let her know I am
+an American. I am going to write her a letter just as soon as I can see
+to do it. But go on with the next, please. You are sure it is not tiring
+you too much?"
+
+"Sure," and the night nurse slipped out another.
+
+  MY DEAR GODSON:
+
+  It was very nice of you to answer my letter so promptly. I am so
+  glad you are an American and do not chew tobacco. You must not feel
+  compelled to answer all my letters because you must be very busy and
+  I have very little to do, so little that I am becoming very
+  restless. I have thrown the bomb in the camp of the enemy, my kin.
+  They are shattered into smithereens. I am going to enter a hospital,
+  take training, and just as soon as I am capable go to France with
+  the Red Cross nurses. I should like to go immediately but I want to
+  be a help not a hindrance, and they say all the untrained persons
+  who butt in on the war zone are a nuisance. Six months of training
+  should make me fit, don't you think? But how should you know?
+
+  I am very happy at the thought of being of some use. I owe it all to
+  you, my dear Godson. If I had not been presented with you I should
+  never have thought of such a thing. Just as soon as I realized that
+  over in the trenches was a human being who wanted to hear from me
+  and whom I could help, I began to take a new interest in the war
+  and all the soldiers, and then I began to feel that maybe I,
+  insignificant little I, might be of some use to those poor soldiers,
+  some use besides just knitting foolish caps and mittens and sending
+  the _Saturday Evening Post_ and cigarettes. I only wish I could go
+  immediately. My training begins to-morrow. Aunt Sally and Cousin
+  Maria feel that it is a terrible blot on the family name. They are
+  sure someone will say that I am doing this because I am not a
+  success in society, although they say over and over that I am. I
+  don't know whether I am or not, all I know is that society is not a
+  success with me. Uncle Bruce is rather nice about it all.
+
+  There are so many I's in this letter I am mortified. I believe
+  writing to a Godson in the trenches is almost like keeping a diary.
+  I am sending you some cards and poker chips (but you mustn't play
+  for money). I'd hate to think that my presents exerted a poor moral
+  influence on my dear Godson. Would you mind just dropping a hint as
+  to what kind of presents would be most acceptable? I have never been
+  in the habit of giving presents to men and the kinds of presents
+  some of my friends give would not be very appropriate, it seems to
+  me. Silver match boxes and cigarette holders would not be very
+  useful, nor would silk socks with initials embroidered on them be
+  much better. Do you like chocolate drops and poetry?
+
+                        Your affectionate Fairy Godmother,
+                                                 POLLY NELSON.
+
+The night nurse laughed outright at the close of the letter and Stephen
+Scott reached out for the packet from which she was extracting a third
+blue envelope.
+
+"If you are going to make fun of them, you can stop."
+
+"I wasn't making fun. I was just thinking what funny presents girls do
+give men."
+
+"Well, so they do, but my little Godmother gave me bully
+presents,--cigarettes to burn, home-made molasses candy and beaten
+biscuit. She had lots of imagination in the presents she sent and the
+blessed child never did burden me with a work-box but sent me a gross
+of safety-pins that beat all the sewing kits on earth. I don't believe
+you like my Godmother much."
+
+"Don't you? Well, I do."
+
+"You should like her because somehow you remind me of her."
+
+"Oh! Have you seen her?"
+
+"Only in my mind's eye. I begged her for a picture of herself but she
+has never sent it. She has promised it, though. You see I got to
+answering her letters in the same spirit in which she wrote to me, only
+I was not quite so frank, I am afraid. She told me everything about
+herself while I told her only my thoughts. I never did tell her I was
+not a homeless soldier of fortune. She thinks I am absolutely friendless
+and dependent on my pay as a private for my living. Sometimes I wish I
+didn't have a sou--at least I have felt that way--but now----"
+
+"But now what?"
+
+"But now I don't think it is so bad to have a little tin," and he held
+one of the little stained hands in his for a moment.
+
+She gently withdrew it and opened a third letter. This was full of
+hospital experiences and so were all that followed. The tone of them
+became more intimate and friendly. The desire to serve was ever
+uppermost--just to get in the War Zone and help.
+
+"I got awfully stuck on her, somehow," confessed the man. "She was so
+sweet and so girlish--I did not say so for fear of scaring her off, but
+I used to write her pretty warm ones, I am afraid."
+
+"Why afraid?"
+
+"Don't you know?"
+
+"How should I know?"
+
+"Why, honey, you must see that I am head over heels in love with you. I
+oughtn't to be telling it to you when I have written my little Godmother
+that as soon as the war is over I am going to find her and tell her the
+same thing. But, somehow, I was loving her only on paper and in my mind;
+but you--you--I love you with every bit of my heart, soul and body." He
+caught her hand and all of the poor little slim blue letters slipped
+from the twine and scattered over the floor.
+
+"Oh, the poor little letters!" she cried. "Is that all they mean to
+you?"
+
+"Oh, honey, they meant a lot to me and still do, but they are just
+letters and you are--you."
+
+"But how about the letters you wrote Miss Polly Nelson? Are they just
+letters to her and nothing more? Don't you think it is possible that
+she may have treasured your letters, especially the pretty warm ones,
+and be looking forward to the end of the war with the same eagerness
+that you have felt up to--say----"
+
+"The minute I laid eyes on you. At first I used to dream maybe you were
+she, but I began to feel that she must be much--younger--somehow, than
+you. You are so capable, so mature in a way. She is little more than a
+child and you are a grown woman."
+
+"I am twenty-one--but the war ages one."
+
+"I don't mean you look old--I just mean you seem so sensible."
+
+"And Miss Nelson didn't?"
+
+"I don't mean that, I just mean she seemed immature. But suppose you
+read the last letter. And couldn't you do it with one hand and let me
+hold the other?"
+
+"Certainly not!" and the night nurse stooped and gathered the scattered
+letters. Leaning over may have accounted for the rosy hue that
+overspread her countenance.
+
+"You certainly read her writing mighty easily. I had a hard time at
+first. I think she writes a rotten fist, although there is plenty of
+character in it, dear little Godmother!"
+
+"Humph! Do you think so? I wouldn't tell her that if I were you--I mean
+that you think her fist is rotten."
+
+"Of course not, but begin, please, and say--couldn't you manage with one
+hand?"
+
+But the night nurse was adamant and drew herself up very primly and
+began to read:
+
+  MY DEAR GODSON:
+
+  I am afraid gratitude has got the better of you. You must not feel
+  that because a girl in America has written you a pile of foolish
+  letters and sent you a few little paltry presents, you must send her
+  such very loverlike letters in return. I am disappointed in you,
+  Godson. I had an idea that you were steadier. Just suppose I were a
+  designing female who was going to hold you up and drag you through
+  the wounded-affections court? There is quite enough in your last two
+  letters to justify such a proceeding. It may be only your poverty
+  that will restrain me. In the first place, you don't know me from
+  Adam or rather Eve. I may be a Fairy Godmother with a crooked back
+  and a black cat, who prefers a broom-stick to a limousine; I may
+  have a hare-lip and a mean disposition; I may write vers libre and
+  believe in dress reform. In fact I am a pig in a poke and you are a
+  very foolish person to think you want to carry me off without ever
+  looking at me. I won't say that I don't want to see you and know
+  you, because I do. I have been very honest with you in my letters
+  because, as I told you once, it has seemed almost like keeping a
+  diary to write to you, and I think a person who is not honest in a
+  diary is as bad as the person who cheats at solitaire. When the war
+  is over if you want to look me up you will find me in Louisville,
+  Kentucky. When you do find me, I want you to be nothing but my
+  Godson. You may not like me a bit and I may find you
+  unbearable,--somehow, I don't believe I shall, though. I do hope you
+  will like me, too. One thing I promise--that is, not to fall in love
+  with anyone else until I have looked you over. And you--I fancy you
+  see no females to fall in love with.
+
+  I never let myself think about your getting killed. As Fairy
+  Godmother I cast a spell about you to protect you. There are times
+  when I almost wish you could be safely wounded. Those are the times
+  when I doubt the efficacy of my prayers and the powers of my fairy
+  gifts.
+
+  And now for the news: I am going to the front! I have worked it by
+  strategy. A girl I know has had all her papers made out ready to
+  join the Red Cross nurses, and now at the last minute her young man
+  has stepped in and persuaded her to marry him instead. I have
+  cajoled the papers from her and am leaving in a few hours. Aunt
+  Sally and Cousin Kate, Uncle Bruce and Cousin Maria are half
+  demented. They don't know how I worked it or I am sure they would
+  have the law on me for perjury. I am free, white, and twenty-one
+  now, and they could control me in no other way. Good-by, Godson! I
+  wonder if we will meet somewhere in France. I will write you when I
+  can, but I am afraid I shall not be able to send any more presents
+  for a while.
+
+                                  Your affectionate Godmother.
+
+"Now don't you hate and despise me for telling you what I did just now?
+You see she says she will at least not fall in love with anyone else
+until she looks me over, and think what I have done! What must I do? I
+am going to try not to tell you I love you any more until that other
+girl knows what a blackguard I am, but you must understand all the time
+that I do."
+
+"I understand nothing, Mr. Stephen Scott. I am simply the night nurse in
+the convalescent ward and you have asked me to read some letters to you,
+and I have read them; and now it is my duty to forget what is in them,
+and I am going to do it,--I have done it. All I can say is that you
+might give Miss Polly Nelson the chance to find someone else she likes
+better than she does you before you are so quick to take for granted she
+will stick to her bargain, too. If there is any jilting going on, we
+Southern girls rather prefer to be the jilters than the jiltees."
+
+"Don't say jilting! It isn't fair. Please be good to me! I am so
+miserable."
+
+The night nurse smiled in spite of herself and felt his pulse.
+
+"There now! Just as I thought! You have worked yourself up into an
+abnormal pulse and I shall have to start a chart on you."
+
+"Abnormal nothing! How is a fellow's pulse to remain normal when you put
+your dear little fingers on his wrist? But I forgot! I am not going to
+make love to you until I can let my Godmother know. Maybe she has met
+some grand English Tommy by this time----" And then he groaned aloud and
+cried: "But I don't want her to do that, either!"
+
+"Blessed if I'm not in love with two girls," he thought.
+
+The night nurse sat quietly down to her charts after having gone the
+rounds of her ward. All was quiet. The convalescent soldiers were
+sleeping peacefully, dreaming of home, she hoped. Scott stirred
+restlessly now and then. He could not sleep but watched the busy little
+stained hand of the night nurse as it glided rapidly over the charts.
+She had no light but that of a guttering candle, carefully shaded from
+her patients' eyes, but Scott could see her well-poised head and fine
+profile as she bent over her writing. How lovely she was! Would she ever
+listen to him? How she stood up for her sex,--and still she did not
+exactly repulse him. What a strange name for a girl like that to have!
+Grubb! It was preposterous. Indeed, he felt it his duty to make her
+change that name as soon as possible. Polly Nelson is a pretty
+name--dear little Godmother! Would she despise him, too, like this other
+girl? But did this other one despise him?
+
+The night nurse made her rounds again and then left the ward for a
+moment. When she returned, she came to the American's bedside.
+
+"A letter has just come for you, Mr. Scott."
+
+"For me? Splendid! Will you read it to me?"
+
+"Yes, if you cannot possibly see to do it yourself."
+
+"I might, but I'd rather not."
+
+"It is in the same rotten fist of those I read you to-night."
+
+"My Fairy Godmother! I--I--believe I can see to read that myself."
+
+She handed him the letter. Her hand was trembling a little and so was
+his. She brought the guttering candle and he opened his letter.
+
+
+                                        _Somewhere in France._
+
+  MY DEAR GODSON:
+
+  I have always been so frank with you that I feel I must make a
+  confession. I promised you in my last letter, the one I wrote just
+  before I left home, that I would not fall in love with anyone until
+  after the war, when you were to present yourself in Louisville and
+  we were to view each other for the first time. Dear Godson---- I
+  have not kept my word. They say a man falls in love with his nurse
+  often because of the feeling he has for his mother. She makes it
+  seem as though he were a little child again. I reckon a nurse falls
+  in love with her patient because he seems so like a little boy. She
+  loves him first because of the maternal instinct. Be that as it may,
+  I am in love with one of my patients. I tell you this fearing you
+  may be wounded and you may fall in the hands of a cap and apron, and
+  from a feeling of noblesse oblige you may not grasp the happiness
+  within your reach.
+
+  God bless you, my dear Godson!
+
+                                                   Always,
+                                         YOUR FAIRY GODMOTHER.
+
+  P. S.--He is an American.
+
+A great tear rolled down the scarred cheek of the young soldier and
+splashed on the signature. Then something happened that made him sit up
+very straight in his cot and stretch out a shaking hand for the night
+nurse. She was by his side in a moment.
+
+"Look! Look! The ink is not dry yet. See where that tear dropped! Dry
+ink would not float off like that!" He turned the sheet over. It was a
+chart.
+
+"But you--you--little Fairy Godmother! Who is he?"
+
+"There is only one American in my ward."
+
+"But you said your name was Grubb!"
+
+"That's my official name. Mary Grubb was the girl whose place I got with
+the Red Cross. Do you know, you hurt my feelings terribly when you said
+my fist was rotten?"
+
+And Stephen Scott, holding the little stained and roughened hand in his,
+wondered that he ever could have made such a break.
+
+"Thank God, you are just one girl, after all!" he cried.
+
+But the night nurse wished that there were two of her for a while at
+least: one to stay by the bedside of the convalescent American and one
+to make out the charts that must be got ready for the morning rounds of
+the surgeon in charge.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE CRITICS
+
+
+"Ahem!" said Billie, rapping for order as the girls began all at once to
+say what they thought of "Fairy Godmothers Wanted." The one with the
+burning plot began rattling her paper in preparation of the turn she
+hoped for.
+
+"First general impressions are in order! One at a time, please! You,
+Miss Oldham, you tell us how it strikes you."
+
+"Pleasing on the whole, but----"
+
+"We'll come to the 'buts' later," was the stern mandate of the chairman
+of the day.
+
+"You, Lilian Swift, you next!"
+
+"Too long!" from the blunt Lilian.
+
+"The idea! I think it was just sweet," from the gentle Alabamian.
+
+"I got kind of mixed in the middle and couldn't tell which was the nurse
+and which Polly Nelson," declared one who had evidently gone off into a
+cataleptic fit, no doubt dreaming of a story she meant to write some
+day.
+
+"I never, never could love a man who had deceived me," sighed the
+sentimental one with big eyes and a little mouth.
+
+"Personal predilections not valuable as criticism," said Billie sternly.
+
+Many and various were the opinions expressed. Molly diligently and
+meekly took notes, agreeing heartily with the ones who thought it was
+too long.
+
+"Where must I cut it?" she asked eagerly.
+
+"Cut out all the letters!" suggested Lilian.
+
+"How could she? It is all letters," asked Billie, whose chair was
+becoming a burden as she felt she must get into the discussion.
+
+"Cut 'em, anyhow. Letters in fiction are no good."
+
+"Humph! How about the early English novelists?" asked Molly.
+
+"Dead! Dead! All of them dead!" stormed Lilian.
+
+"Then how about Mary Roberts Rinehart and Booth Tarkington and lots of
+others? Daddy Longlegs is all letters."
+
+"All the samey, it is a poor stunt," insisted the intrepid Lilian. "I
+call it a lazy way to get your idea over."
+
+"Perhaps you are right, but the point is: did I get my idea over?"
+
+"We-ll, yes,--but they tell me editors don't like letter form of
+fiction."
+
+"Certainly none of them have liked this," sighed Molly, who had devoutly
+hoped her little story would sell. The money she made herself was very
+delightful to receive and more delightful to spend. A professor's salary
+can as a rule stand a good deal of supplementing.
+
+"How about the plot, now?" asked Billie, having finished with the
+general impression.
+
+"Slight!"
+
+"Strong!"
+
+"Weak!"
+
+"Impossible!"
+
+"Plausible!"
+
+"Original!"
+
+"Bromidic!"
+
+"Involved!" were the verdicts. The matter was thoroughly threshed out,
+Billie with difficulty keeping order. Nance was called on for the "but"
+that she had been left holding.
+
+"The plot is slight but certainly original in its way. The letters are
+too long, longer than a Godmother would be apt to write, I think. The
+story could be cut to three thousand words, I believe, to its
+advantage."
+
+"I have already cut out about fifteen hundred words," wailed Molly. "The
+first writing was lots longer."
+
+"Gee!" breathed the one eager for a hearing.
+
+"Now for the characterization! Don't all speak at once, but one at a
+time tell what you think of it."
+
+"Did you mean to make Polly so silly?" asked Lilian.
+
+"I--I--perhaps!" faltered Molly.
+
+"Of course if you meant to, why then your characterization is perfect."
+
+"Silly! Why, she is dear," declared the girl from Alabama. "I don't like
+her having to nurse that black man, though."
+
+"Too many points of view!" suddenly blurted out a member who had
+hitherto kept perfectly silent, but she had been eagerly scanning a
+paper whereon was written the requisites for a short story.
+
+"But you see----" meekly began Molly.
+
+"The point of view must either be that of the author solely or one of
+the characters," asserted the knowing one. "Why, you even let us know
+how the Bedouin feels."
+
+"Oh!" gasped the poor author. "I think you would limit the story teller
+too much if you eliminated such things as that."
+
+"Here's what the correspondence course says----"
+
+"Spare us!" cried the club in a chorus.
+
+"I hate all these cut and dried rules!" cried Billie. "It would take all
+the spice out of literature if we stuck to them."
+
+"That's just it," answered Lilian. "We are not making literature but
+trying to sell our stuff. Persons who have arrived can write any old
+way. They can start off with the climax and end up with an introduction
+and their things go, but I'll bet you my hat that you will not find a
+single story by a new writer that does not have to toe the mark drawn by
+the teachers of short story writing."
+
+"Which hat?" teased Billie. "The one you put on for Great-aunt Gertrude?
+If it is that one, I won't bet. I wouldn't read a short story by a new
+writer for it."
+
+"To return to my story," pleaded Molly, "do you think if I rewrite it,
+leave out the letters, strengthen the plot a bit and make Polly a little
+wiser that I might sell it?"
+
+"Sure!" encouraged Lilian.
+
+"Yes, indeed!" echoed Nance.
+
+"And the black man--please cut him out! I can't bear to think of him,"
+from the girl from Alabama.
+
+"Dialogue,--how about it?" asked the chairman.
+
+"Pretty good, but a little stilted," was the verdict of several critics.
+
+"I think you are all of you simply horrid!" exclaimed Mary Neil, who had
+been silent and sullen through the whole evening. "I think it is the
+best story that has been read all year and I believe you are just
+jealous to tear it to pieces this way."
+
+"Stuff and nonsense!" said Lilian.
+
+"We do hope we haven't hurt your feelings, Mrs. Green," cried the girl
+who was taking the correspondence course.
+
+"Hurt my feelings! The very idea! I read my story to get help from you
+and not praise. I am going to think over what you have said and do my
+best to correct the faults, if I come to the conclusion you are right."
+
+"You would have a hard time doing what everybody says," laughed Nance,
+"as no two have agreed."
+
+"Well, I can pick and choose among so many opinions," said Molly,
+putting her manuscript back in its big envelope. "I might do as my
+mother did when she got the opinion of two physicians on the diet she
+was to have: she simply took from each man the advice that best suited
+her taste and between the two managed to be very well fed, and, strange
+to say, got well of her malady under the composite treatment."
+
+"Ahem!" said the girl with the burning plot, rattling her manuscript
+audibly so that the hardhearted Billie must perforce recognize her and
+give her the floor.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+"I HAD A LITTLE HUSBAND NO BIGGER THAN MY THUMB"
+
+
+"Aunt Nance, what's the use you ain't got no husband an' baby children?"
+Mildred always said use instead of reason.
+
+"Lots of reasons!" answered Nance, smiling at her little companion.
+Mildred had moved herself and all her belongings into the guest-chamber.
+Her mother had at first objected, but when she found it made Nance happy
+to have the child with her, she gave her consent.
+
+"Ain't no husbands come along wantin' you?"
+
+"That is one of the reasons."
+
+"I'm going to make Dodo marry you when he gets some teeth."
+
+"Thank you, darling! Dodo would make a dear little husband."
+
+"Dodo wouldn't never say nothin' mean to you. He's got more disposition
+than any baby in the family."
+
+"I am sure he wouldn't," said Nance, trying to count the stitches as she
+neatly turned the heel of the grey sock she was knitting. Nance was
+always knitting in those days.
+
+"'Cose if I kin get you a husband a little teensy weensy bit taller than
+Dodo, I'll let you know."
+
+"Fine! But Dodo will grow."
+
+"Maybe you'll make out to shrink up some. Katy kin shrink you. My muvver
+said Katy kin shrink up anything. She done shrinked up Dodo's little
+shirts jes' big enough for my dolly. I's jes' crazy 'bout Katy. I'm
+gonter ask her kin she shrink you up no bigger'n Dodo an' then won't you
+be cunning? You can look jes' like you look now only teensy weensy
+little. Your little feet'll be so long, not great big ones like mine,
+an' your little hands will be 'bout as big as my little fingers
+an'--an'--you kin knit little bits of baby socks an' I kin take you out
+ridin' in my little doll-baby carriage, all tucked in nice."
+
+"But then I'll be too little to marry Dodo. You won't trust your doll to
+Dodo, and if I'm so teensy maybe he might break me."
+
+"Well, then, I guess Katy'll have to stretch you some. She done
+stretched the shirt mos' a mile."
+
+"What do you say to taking a little walk?"
+
+"I say: 'Glory be!' That's what Kizzie, our cook, says when she's
+happy."
+
+"Shall we take Dodo out in his carriage?"
+
+"If I can put my dolly in, too!"
+
+Dodo was awake and pleased to be included in this outing, if gurglings
+and splutterings were an indication of happiness. He and the doll were
+tucked safely in. Katy, who had been longing for the time to come when
+she could scrub the nursery, was delighted to be relieved of her charge
+for the time being.
+
+"Where shall we walk?" asked Nance.
+
+"Down by the lake! My dolly ain't never seed the lake yet. They's a
+little blue boat down there what my papa, the 'fessor, done say he
+gonter set sail in some day. He say he gonter go way out in the middle
+of the lake where th' ain't no little girls with curls to come tickle
+his nose in the morning. My papa is kind and good, but he sho' do hate
+to have his nose tickled with curls early in the morning."
+
+The lake! How many memories it brought back to Nance! The blue boat
+might be the same one in which Judy Kean had her memorable midnight
+jaunt, or was it a canoe? Nance smiled at the picture that arose in her
+mind's eye. It was their Junior year and Judy had gone off in a fit of
+jealousy and rage, and when she came to herself she was out in the
+middle of the lake while Molly and Nance rowed frantically after her.
+What a time they had covering their tracks to keep Judy from being found
+out and perhaps even expelled! Nance laughed aloud.
+
+The sun was warm on that day in late March, almost like a southern sun.
+Dodo, lazy baby, had slipped from his sitting posture and lay flat on
+his back. He had the same characteristics as Mildred's doll baby: the
+moment he lay down his eyes closed.
+
+"Oh, what a sleepy husband I have got!" cried Nance. "Let's camp out
+here, darling. I brought my knitting and while my little husband
+sleeps----"
+
+"And my doll baby, too!"
+
+"You can play in that nice clean sand. Don't go too close to the water."
+
+There was a stretch of beach at that side of the lake where a small pier
+had been built for a boat-landing. The sand was fine and white, a most
+delectable medium for houses or pies, whatever the young sculptor wished
+to create.
+
+Nance seated herself on a nice warm rock while her little companion
+busied herself collecting pebbles for the castle she contemplated
+building. The sock grew under the girl's skillful fingers while her
+thoughts were miles away from the poor soldier whose foot it was
+destined to cover. Dodo snoozed peacefully and no doubt the doll did,
+too.
+
+"Look! Look! Aunt Nance, I've done found some kitty flowers!" cried
+Mildred, rushing to Nance with a switch of willow catkins she had found
+growing near the water's edge.
+
+    "'I had a little pussy
+        Her coat was silver grey.
+      She lived down in the meadow,
+        She never ran away.
+
+    "'Her name was always Pussy,
+        She never was a cat.
+      'Cause she was a Pussy-Willow.
+        Now what do you think of that?'"
+
+sang Nance. "Now let me teach you that nice verse so you can say it to
+your father."
+
+Mildred obediently learned the poetry in so short a time that her
+teacher marveled at her cleverness and good memory.
+
+"Now, darling, you mustn't go quite so close to the water again. Aunt
+Nance will gather a big armful of the pussy-willows to take back to
+Mother, but you might get your little tootsies wet if you go too close
+to the edge. Then I'll have to put you in the carriage with my husband
+and run home every step of the way."
+
+Mildred trotted off with assurances of caution. Nance settled herself to
+her knitting and her thoughts. What a boon this universal knitting has
+become to women who want to think and be busy at the same time! The
+girl's thoughts were centered on herself. What was she to do with her
+life? The desire to teach had left her with the years she had spent
+nursing her father and mother. United States was on the verge of
+war--any moment it might be declared. That would mean the women of the
+land would be in demand just as they had been in Europe. There would be
+work to do, but what was her share to be?
+
+This little breathing time with Molly was very sweet, but it could not
+go on forever. The time would come when she must take up life again. Her
+unruly thoughts would dwell on how different things would have been had
+Andy McLean not shown himself so unreasonable. She might have gone to
+the front with him. There was work in the hospitals in France for others
+besides trained nurses, lots of work! Cooking, cleaning, sewing, peeling
+potatoes, scrubbing floors--nothing was too menial for her. It would
+have been sweet to work near Andy, shoulder to shoulder in spirit even
+if he would happen to be the surgeon in charge and she a poor scrub
+girl. She might have been taking care of some of the war orphans.
+Minding little babies was her long suit, it seemed. A big tear gathered
+and spilled on the toe of the sock that was being so neatly finished
+off.
+
+A shrill scream broke on the still air.
+
+"I'm a-sinkin'! I'm a-sinkin'!"
+
+"Mildred!" cried Nance, jumping to her feet.
+
+"Never mind, nurse, I'll go after her," said a stern voice from behind
+her. "You had better look after your other charge," in a tone which made
+no attempt to veil its sarcasm.
+
+Dodo had awakened and was sitting up in the carriage reaching for the
+willow catkins. His position was precarious, as one more inch might have
+sent him headlong in the sand.
+
+Nance dropped her knitting and grabbed the venturesome baby while the
+stern voice materialized into a tall grey figure with sandy hair who ran
+towards the water's edge, skinning out of his coat and vest as he ran
+and in some miraculous way also divesting himself of his shoes. His hat
+he had already hurled at Nance's feet.
+
+Mildred had walked out on the little pier and decided that she would get
+in the pretty blue boat that her father considered such a safe refuge
+from tickling curls. It was bobbing about most invitingly in easy
+stepping distance.
+
+"Won't Aunt Nance be 'stonished?" the child had said to herself. "She's
+gonter holler out: 'M-i-i-l-dred! Where you Mi--ldred baby?' an' I
+gonter lay low an' keep on a-sayin' nothin'."
+
+She put out her little foot and set it firmly on the bow of the boat
+that was almost grazing the edge of the landing.
+
+"My legs is a-gettin' mos' long enough to step up to the moon an'
+stars," she boasted.
+
+But how strangely boats behaved! This one did not stay still as she had
+expected but ran away from her. Her legs had not grown nearly so long
+as she had thought and they refused to grow another bit. The boat
+got farther and farther away and the horrid little pier seemed to be
+moving, too, and in the opposite direction. The time came when Mildred
+must choose between land and water. She decided to stay on shore and
+with a mighty effort jerked her little foot from the unsteady blue boat.
+Three years going on four is not a period of great equilibrium. Fate
+took matters out of Mildred's hands and kersplash! she went in the cold
+waters of the lake. It was not very deep so close to the shore, but
+neither was the little girl so very tall. By standing on her tiptoes she
+might have managed to keep her inquisitive nose out of the water, but
+the naughty blue boat came swinging back to her rescue and she clutched
+first the painter and then the side of the boat, screaming lustily as
+she clung.
+
+The grey figure with the sandy hair ran lightly along the pier and with
+one swoop gathered the child up into his arms. He might have saved
+himself the trouble of taking off his coat and shoes, but he had seen
+the child as she fell in the water and did not know what would be
+required of him as life saver. Mildred was sobbing dolefully as she
+buried her wet curls in the neck of her rescuer.
+
+"Your nurse should have looked after you," he muttered.
+
+"She had her husband to 'tend to," said Mildred, "an' I was a-keepin'
+keer of myself. 'Sides she ain't my nurse but my 'loved aunty."
+
+"Oh! And who may you be?"
+
+"I'm Mildred Carbuncle Green." The family name of Molly's mother, which
+was Carmichael, was thus perverted by this scion of the race.
+
+"And your aunt's name?" asked the young man as he picked up his
+discarded coat and wrapped it around his burden.
+
+"She's Aunt Nance----"
+
+"Nance Oldham!" and he almost dropped little Mildred. "And you say she
+was busy with her husband?"
+
+"Yessir! He keeps her busy mos' of the time."
+
+The rescue and this conversation had taken but a moment. In the
+meantime, poor Nance had shoved her little husband back in the carriage
+and was rapidly wheeling him towards the scene of disaster.
+
+She had recognized Andy McLean in the tall grey figure and sandy hair.
+The moment he had spoken to her so sternly she had known it was he. At
+that moment she envied no creature in the world so much as an ostrich.
+If she could only bury her head in the sand. Why should Fate be so cruel
+to her? Why should Andy McLean come back on her horizon at that moment
+when she was neglecting her duty? But then, she reflected, if he had not
+come back at that psychological moment either Mildred would have drowned
+or Dodo broken his neck. She could not have rescued both of them at
+once. Indeed, both of them might have been killed! The fact that the
+water was shallow and Mildred could have walked out of it was no comfort
+to Nance, nor did it allay her suffering and self-reproaches in the
+least to know that almost every baby that has grown to manhood has at
+one time or another fallen out of his carriage or bed, down the steps or
+even out of the window.
+
+Andy McLean, too, was going through some uncomfortable moments as he
+held the dripping child close in his arms and made his way across the
+beach to Nance. There had never been a moment since he and Nance had
+parted that he had not regretted his hasty words; but what good were
+regrets? Nance could not have cared for him or she would have felt that
+at her father's death he was the person to whom she must turn instead of
+that Dr. Flint. As far as he could see, there was no reason under Heaven
+why Nance should not have married him immediately. He knew nothing
+of her mother's determination to give up her public life nor of her
+decision to remain at home for Nance to nurse. He had not yet learned of
+Mrs. Oldham's death, as he had arrived at Wellington only the evening
+before, and Mrs. McLean, with a wisdom sometimes granted mothers, had
+not mentioned Nance's name to him, much less the fact that she was even
+then visiting the Greens.
+
+"Married! and so engrossed with her husband that she let little children
+entrusted to her care fall in the water and almost fall out of baby
+carriages! But where is the--the--cad?" was what Andy was thinking as he
+approached the frantic Nance, who was pushing the carriage as for dear
+life through the heavy sand.
+
+"Mildred! Mildred! You promised not to go near the water's edge!"
+
+"I never went near it but jes' ran out on the little wooden street. I
+wasn't goin' to be naughty. I knowed I might get my feet wet down by the
+edge so I walked on the planks. I never done nothin' nor nothin'! 'Twas
+the bad little blue boat what wobbled."
+
+Nance and Andy both laughed at the amusing child. The laugh made matters
+easier for them.
+
+Brown eyes looked into blue and then such a blush o'erspread their
+countenances that a day's fishing under a summer sun could not have
+accomplished.
+
+"You had better put her in the carriage--it is warm there and I can
+carry Dodo."
+
+"No, I will keep her wrapped in my coat. That will be better."
+
+"But you--you might be cold."
+
+"Not at all! I never catch cold," shortly.
+
+Nance remembered otherwise, but there was nothing to do but turn and
+wheel the baby back to the house on the campus.
+
+"I--you must think--I know I was careless to let such an accident happen
+to my charges. I have no excuse--I was just thinking!"
+
+"About your husband, I fancy!"
+
+Again Nance's cheeks were crimson, remembering only too well what her
+thoughts had been as she sat in the sand knitting.
+
+"I----"
+
+"Mildred told me about him," said Andy grimly.
+
+"Did she?" laughed Nance, thinking that Andy was speaking of Dodo, of
+course. "He is a darling husband."
+
+"Humph!" They walked on in silence, Andy taking great strides with
+Mildred clasped closely in his arms, while Nance wheeled the baby
+carriage, almost running to keep up.
+
+"I don't know what to call you," said Andy at last.
+
+"Call me? Why, call me Nance! Why not? My name is still Nance no matter
+what has happened."
+
+"I--I--perhaps he wouldn't like it."
+
+"Who?"
+
+"Your husband! Is it Flint?"
+
+"Andy McLean, you are a fool! There is no other word for you!" and Nance
+grabbed Dodo from his carriage and ran up the steps, thankful that they
+had arrived at the Square Deal.
+
+"If not Flint, who?" muttered Andy under his breath. "I am going to stay
+here until I find out."
+
+Molly was not at home to receive her wet daughter. Nance and Katy rubbed
+her down and dressed her while Andy waited miserably in the library. Why
+had his mother not warned him that Nance Oldham was in Wellington? They
+had had a long talk and she had told him news of all their old friends.
+Molly and Edwin had been mentioned again and again but the fact that
+they had a guest had been kept dark. He had never talked to his mother
+about his break with Nance. A certain reticence in his make-up withheld
+him. Many times he had longed to put his head in her lap and tell her
+all about it.
+
+A great intimacy existed between Mrs. McLean and this only child, but
+instead of his being like a daughter to her, as is the case sometimes
+with a woman and an only child when that child happens to be a son, this
+worthy mother had adjusted herself more into the relationship of an
+elder brother to Andy. There were few if any subjects they could not
+discuss together, but somehow he could not bring himself to tell her of
+Nance. She had known they were engaged--that was easy to tell, and she
+knew the engagement was no more--that was all. Mrs. McLean bided her
+time.
+
+"They are young yet," she had said to her husband. "Some
+misunderstanding has come up, but if they are really meant for one
+another it will be explained away. If they can't forgive, then they
+are not suited for mating."
+
+The good woman had been delighted beyond measure that Nance should be in
+Wellington while her son was on his farewell visit to her, and she had
+devoutly prayed that they might meet by chance, just as they had. Of
+course she had not stipulated in her prayers that Andy should mistake
+Nance for the Greens' nurse and reprimand her for carelessness; and then
+fish Mildred out of the water; and get Dodo and the hated Dr. Flint
+hopelessly mixed, and be called a fool for his blunder!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+NANCE PACKS HER TRUNK
+
+
+Molly, coming in hurriedly from her labors at the French War Relief
+rooms where she had been engaged in making surgical dressings until her
+back ached so that she had more sympathy for the poor wounded than ever,
+if possible, found young Dr. McLean cooling his heels and drying his
+coat by her library fire.
+
+"Andy! I am so glad to see you!" she cried, grasping both of his hands.
+"When did you come? Did you know Nance Oldham is with me?"
+
+"Yes, I have seen her," grimly.
+
+"Oh, then you know of her trouble?"
+
+"Trouble! I shouldn't call it that. She evidently does not consider it
+in that light."
+
+"Andy McLean, how can you say such a thing?"
+
+"Well, I formed my opinions from the evidence of my own eyes. In fact,
+she told me with her own lips that she was contented; if not in so many
+words, at least she gave me that impression."
+
+"Resigned, of course! That is Nance's way, but she is very sad and
+lonesome for all that."
+
+"Lonesome! Ye Gods, how many does she want?"
+
+"Excuse me, Andy, but you are talking like a goose," declared Molly,
+irritated in spite of herself.
+
+"Thank you, madam," he said, bowing low. "Your guest has just called me
+a fool and now you call me a goose. I bid you good-by."
+
+"Good-by, indeed! Andy McLean, sit down here and let me send for your
+father. I believe my soul you are in a fever or something." Molly pushed
+him down in a chair near the fire. "Why, Andy, your coat is damp! Where
+have you been?"
+
+She drew a chair by him and seated herself, looking anxiously into his
+flushed face. Andy laughed in a hard tone.
+
+"Perhaps you are right, but don't send for Father. I got my coat wet in
+a perfectly sane way, but perhaps you had better find out about that
+from Mrs. Fl--Nance--I mean."
+
+Andy balked at that name of Mrs. Flint and then, besides, Nance had
+called him a fool when he had hinted at the doctor's being the happy
+man. At this juncture little Mildred came running into the library.
+
+"Mumsy! Mumsy! Is you heard 'bout me an' the blue boat?"
+
+"No, darling! But what makes your curls so wet?"
+
+"That was that baddest blue boat. It wouldn't stay still 'til I got
+in--it jes' moved and moved--an' the little wooden street, it moved an'
+moved an' I went kerblim! kersplash!"
+
+"In the lake! Oh, Mildred! I know you didn't mind Aunt Nance. Are you
+cold? Did Aunt Nance get wet? Where is Dodo?"
+
+"You 'fuses me with so many ain't's an' do's and didn't's."
+
+"You tell me all about it," said the doting mother, trying to compose
+herself as she gathered the first-born in her arms.
+
+"Well, you see, me'n' Aunt Nance we went a-walkin' an' we tooked Dodo
+along an' my dolly, an' Aunt Nance she says that one use she ain't got
+no husband is 'cause don't no husband want her, an' I done tol' her that
+if Katy kin shrink her up some that Dodo kin be her husband. You see,
+Mumsy, I been a-feelin' sorry for Aunt Nance ever since that time I mos'
+went to sleep in her lap an' she talked about a beau lover what got to
+fightin' with her an' she hit him back. She wetted my ear all up with
+her tears. I jes' done thunk somethin'!" the child exclaimed, getting
+out of her mother's lap and peering curiously into Andy's face. "Is you
+the Andy what talked so crule to my Aunt Nance? 'Cause if you is, I'm
+sorry you done pulled me out'n the lake."
+
+"Mildred! Mildred!" admonished Molly, but in her heart of hearts she
+knew that what the enfant terrible was saying to the young doctor was
+no doubt of a very salutary nature. He needed a good talking to and he
+was getting it.
+
+"I am the one," said Andy meekly.
+
+"Well, when Dodo grows up to be big enough he is goin' to--to--cut you
+up in little pieces. He's growin' up fast an' bein' a husband is makin'
+him cut his teeth early----"
+
+"Molly Brown!" interrupted Andy McLean eagerly. "Is Nance not married?"
+
+"Married! The idea, Andy! Of course not!"
+
+"Yes, she is! She's married to Dodo Green. I married 'em this morning,"
+declared Mildred defiantly.
+
+"Oh, oh! I see it all now!" laughed Molly hysterically. "You were
+talking about her mythical marriage while I was speaking of her mother's
+death."
+
+"Her mother dead? I had not heard a word of it. Strange that so
+important a woman as Mrs. Oldham should have died without my seeing it
+mentioned in the paper."
+
+"But Mrs. Oldham dropped out of public life two years ago, when her
+husband died, in fact. Nance had hardly rested from the long siege of
+nursing her father before she began on her mother."
+
+Andy bowed his sandy-haired head in his hands and groaned:
+
+"Fool! Fool! Every kind of fool and goose you and Nance choose to call
+me,--fool and knave! Bad-tempered brute! Jealous idiot! Oh, Molly,
+please call Nance."
+
+When Nance had hurled her "fool" at Andy's sandy head, she flew
+up-stairs, determined never to speak to him again. She longed for a few
+quiet moments in her own room, but Mildred must be rubbed down and
+dressed before she could seek retirement. She was sure he would leave
+the house immediately. His coat was wet and no doubt his vest and shirt,
+too, after having carried the dripping child such a distance. Of course
+he would not want to call on the Greens while she was in the house. The
+girl bitterly regretted having timed her visit so unfortunately. The
+Greens and McLeans were very intimate, and would perforce see each
+other often. She hated to be a wet blanket--a skeleton at the feast. She
+determined to pack her trunk and go on a promised visit to an old
+college friend then living in New York. Molly would object, she knew,
+but it was surely best for all of them that she should take herself off
+for a few weeks.
+
+Nance was always an orderly person and packing a trunk with her was a
+very simple matter. She began in her usual systematic way and had
+already folded her dresses neatly in the trays and was emptying the
+bureau drawers when Molly's voice was heard calling her from the lower
+hall.
+
+"Nance! Oh, Nance!"
+
+She sounded quite excited. No doubt she had just been informed of
+Mildred's accident and wanted to hear the details of it.
+
+"Coming!" called Nance, hurrying down the steps. "Oh, Molly, what do you
+think of me for taking out the children and almost drowning Mildred? And
+while that was going on, little Dodo came within an ace of tumbling out
+of the carriage on his precious sleepy head! You will never trust them
+with me again."
+
+"Nonsense! Mildred is old enough not to try to get in boats alone, and
+as for Dodo, Aunt Mary always said: 'Whin chilluns grows up 'thout ever
+gittin' a tumble, they is sho' to be idjits.'"
+
+"Well, then, my real duty was to let him tumble," laughed Nance. "What
+do you want with me, honey? I am very busy."
+
+"Not too busy to come in and talk with me a little while," insisted the
+wily Molly, putting her arm around her friend's waist and leading her to
+the library door.
+
+"I do want to talk to you a moment," agreed Nance. "Molly, I am going
+away for a few weeks." They had reached the door, which was ajar, and
+Andy, ensconced in the sleepy-hollow chair dear to the professor's
+bones, could plainly hear the conversation.
+
+"Going away! You are going to do no such thing."
+
+"I must. There is no use in asking me why--you know why---- It is too
+hard for me and there is no use in pretending it is not."
+
+"But, Nance----"
+
+"I have begun to pack and I will go to-morrow."
+
+Instead of the hospitable protestations characteristic of Molly, that
+young housewife said not a word, but giving her friend a little push
+towards the fireplace, she grabbed up Mildred and rushed from the room,
+closing the door after her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+A DAMP COAT
+
+
+Andy undoubled himself with alacrity and sprang from the sleepy-hollow
+chair. His stern face was softened and filled with a boyish eagerness.
+
+"Oh, Nance! Can't you forgive me?"
+
+"Excuse me, Dr. McLean, I did not know you were still here," and Nance
+turned to leave the room.
+
+Andy with long strides reached the door first and with his back against
+it held out beseeching hands.
+
+"Yes, I'm here and am going to stay here----"
+
+"Well, I am not! Please let me pass." Nance was filled with a righteous
+indignation against Molly at having played this trick on her.
+
+"But, my dear, I must tell you what a fool I have been----"
+
+"That is not necessary. I know."
+
+Andy laughed. Nance had a laconic way of putting things that always
+tickled his humor.
+
+"Now you sound like yourself, honey, but oh, please act like yourself!
+The real Nance Oldham could not be so cruel as to go off without letting
+me explain--I have no excuse--there could be none for my blind rage and
+jealousy--none unless loving you too hard could be called one. Will you
+listen to me?"
+
+"I shall have to unless I stop up my ears, since you stop up the
+doorway." Nance was very pale and trembling. Two years of suffering
+could not be done away with in a moment and the girl had surely
+suffered.
+
+"Couldn't we sit down and let me tell you?"
+
+"We could!"
+
+Andy eagerly directed Nance to the sofa, but she sedately seated herself
+in a small isolated sewing rocker. Andy accepted the amendment and
+placed his chair as near to hers as the frigid atmosphere around her
+permitted.
+
+"Before I explain I must apologize. I would have done it the very day
+after that awful row we had, the very moment after it, if I had not
+thought you hated me."
+
+"And now?"
+
+"And now I am going to apologize and explain, whether you hate me or
+not. I could do it lots better if you would let me hold your hand while
+I am doing it," but Nance drew Molly's knitting from a bag hung on the
+back of the chair and declared her hands were otherwise occupied. Molly
+had reached the purling end of a sleeveless sweater and no doubt would
+be glad of Nance's expert assistance.
+
+"Nance, there never has been any other woman in my life but you, you and
+my mother. You know perfectly well from the time I met you, when I was
+at Exmoor College and you were here at Wellington, that you were the
+only girl in the world for me. I had a kind of notion in my fool brain
+that I was going to be the only man in the world for you. When we were
+engaged I thought I was, but when I realized that Dr. Flint was paying
+you such devoted attention, at your home constantly----"
+
+"My father's physician!"
+
+"Yes, I know,--but, honey, you see you were way up there in Vermont and
+I was down in New York and I was hungry for you all the time, and when
+your father died I thought you would pick right up and come to me--I
+knew nothing of your mother's determination to stay with you--nothing of
+her illness--nothing but that you were staying in the same town with
+Flint and I must go back to New York. You did not tell me."
+
+"Well, hardly, after the way you raged and tore! I felt if you could
+rage that way we had better separate."
+
+"But, my dear, I'll never rage that way again--I've learned my lesson.
+Can't you forgive me?" Nance was silent.
+
+"I love you just as much as I always did,--more, in fact. When little
+Mildred Green told me you had let her fall in the water because you were
+so busy with your husband, I wanted to die that minute. Of course I
+thought it was Flint. How could I know the child was playing a game with
+you? Nance, do you hate me as much as you did that terrible day two
+years ago?"
+
+"Yes!" Nance's answer was very low but Andy heard it.
+
+"Well, then, there is no use in saying any more," he sprang to his feet,
+his face grey with misery.
+
+"I didn't hate you then at all--nor do I now."
+
+"Oh, Nance, don't tease me! Can you forgive me?" and poor Andy sank on
+his knees and bowed his head on her knees.
+
+Nance's arms were around him in a moment. She hugged his sandy head to
+her bosom with one hand and patted his back with the other while he gave
+a great sob.
+
+"Andy McLean, you are still wringing wet. Get up from here this minute
+and take off that coat and let me dry it! And your shirt is damp, too!
+My, what a boy! Here, sit right close to the fire and dry that wet
+sleeve."
+
+Andy meekly submitted in a daze. Nance's motherly attitude and sudden
+melting were too much for him. The coat was hung by the fire to dry
+while the young doctor stood helplessly by in his shirt sleeves.
+
+"And now, Andy, I'm going to apologize to you and ask you to forgive
+me," declared Nance, stoutly trying to go on with her knitting.
+
+But Andy firmly took it from her and possessed himself of those busy
+hands.
+
+"I was worse than you--when you said those hard things to me they hurt
+like fury--you didn't know how they did hurt, but I did, and I should
+not have done the same thing to you. I said worse things to you than you
+did to me,--at least I tried to."
+
+"You did pretty well," said Andy whimsically, pressing one of the
+imprisoned hands to his lips.
+
+"Dr. Flint did want to marry me; I guess he still does, but--but----"
+
+"But what, lassie?" Sometimes Andy dropped into his parents' vernacular.
+
+"I am not going to tell a man in his shirt sleeves why I didn't marry
+Dr. Flint," said Nance firmly. "It is too unpicturesque."
+
+"Then I'll put on my coat."
+
+"No, you won't! I wouldn't tell a man in a wet coat, either."
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"Because I don't like to lay my brown head on a damp shoulder. Why don't
+you do as I told you and dry that shirt sleeve? Hold it close to the
+fire, sir!"
+
+"I won't do it unless you tell me why you didn't marry Dr. Flint."
+
+"Well, then, to keep you from catching your death of cold, I will
+tell you, but remember I have saved your life. It was--it was
+because--because he didn't have sandy hair and a bad temper," and Nance
+was enfolded in the despised shirt sleeves and found a very nice dry
+spot on which to lay her brown head.
+
+The sun had set and twilight was upon them. The front door opened to
+admit the master of the house, but Molly was in ambush ready to catch
+him to keep him out of the library. Kizzie had started in to mend the
+fire but Molly stopped her.
+
+"Never mind the fire, Kizzie. It is all right for such a warm evening.
+Give us tea in the den."
+
+"Why all of this mystery?" asked Edwin Green as he followed his wife
+back to the den, going on tiptoe as she demanded.
+
+"Andy and Nance are in there."
+
+"Andy McLean! Fine! I want to see him. Won't he be here to tea? I'll go
+in and speak to him."
+
+"You'll do no such thing! Edwin Green, you may be--in fact, are, a grand
+lecturer on English, but you have no practical sense. Don't you know you
+might break in just at the wrong moment and Andy may get off to France
+without their making it up?"
+
+"Making up what? Who making up: the Allies and the central powers?"
+
+"Oh, Edwin, you know I mean Nance and Andy!"
+
+"What are they making up? If it is a row, let's go help them."
+
+"Not a soul shall go in that room until they come out, unless it is over
+my dead body."
+
+"Well, well! I'd rather stay in this room with your live body than go in
+there over your dead one," and the professor pulled his wife down on the
+sofa by him, "especially if you will give me some tea," as Kizzie came
+in grinning with the tea tray.
+
+"They's co'tin' a-goin' on in yander, boss. The fiah is low an' the
+lights ain't lit, but Miss Molly she guard that do' like a cat do a
+mouse hole. Cose Miss Nance ain't got no maw to futher things up for her
+but Miss Molly is all ready to fly off an' git the preacher, seems
+like."
+
+"I can't remember that things were made easy for me this way when I was
+addressing my wife," complained Edwin as he stirred his tea with his arm
+around his wife, a combination that could not have been made had his
+arm not been long and Molly still slender.
+
+"Ungrateful man! Why, Judy and Kent took the bus from Fontainebleau to
+Barbizon when they were simply dying to walk, just to give you a chance.
+Have you forgotten?"
+
+"I haven't forgotten the walk--I never will--and if they really rode on
+my account, I'll pass on the favor to other lovers and stay out of my
+library until the cows come home; that is, if you will stay with me."
+
+Molly told him then of the whole affair and how Mildred had righted
+matters, telling Andy just exactly the right thing to bring him to his
+senses.
+
+"I am almost sure they have made up and are engaged again," sighed Molly
+ecstatically. A romance was dear to her soul and being happily married
+herself, she felt like furthering the love affairs of all her friends.
+
+"They are either engaged or dead," laughed Edwin. "Such silence
+emanating from the library must bode extreme calamity or extreme
+bliss. If it continues much longer I think it is my duty as a
+householder to break in the door and offer congratulations or call the
+coroner, as the case demands."
+
+"It is getting late. Maybe I had better go in and ask Andy to stay to
+dinner."
+
+Molly, who had a deep-rooted objection to noise and usually talked in a
+low tone, now spoke in a loud voice as she bumped her way along the
+hall, pushing chairs and rattling the hat rack and calling out shrilly
+to the amused husband following her. Strange to say, she could not
+remember on which side of the door the knob was, although she had lived
+several years in that house. She fumblingly hunted it and finally opened
+the door with a great rattle.
+
+Nance was seated sedately knitting and Andy was holding his coat close
+to the dying flames. The room was almost dark.
+
+"Kizzie should have lighted the lamp and attended to the fire," Molly
+said briskly. Oh, Molly, how could you be so untruthful, blaming things
+on poor Kizzie, too? (Molly's conscience did hurt her for dragging
+Kizzie in and she gave the girl a long coveted blue hat that she had
+meant to keep for second best, feeling that it might act as a salve on
+her own tender, truth-loving soul. Kizzie, quite ignorant of the cause
+for this generosity, gratefully accepted the hat and asked no
+questions.)
+
+"Yes, it gets dark before one realizes," said Nance demurely.
+
+"Ahem!" from the professor.
+
+"Oh, Andy, your coat is still wet! Mildred told me you wrapped it around
+her. I'll get you Edwin's smoking jacket and have your coat dried. You
+must stay to dinner with us. I can 'phone your mother not to expect you
+at home."
+
+Andy did not need much persuading, but accepted the invitation with
+alacrity. Molly called up Mrs. McLean to ask for the loan of her son for
+dinner.
+
+"Yes!" exclaimed that wise lady at the other end of the wire. "I have
+been expecting a telephone call for the last half hour. You may keep him
+but I shall wait up to see him when he gets home. I am sur-r-e he'll
+have something to tell me. From my back window I saw Nance with the
+perambulator full of babies on her way to the lake and I sent Andy off
+for a walk, first putting a flea in his ear by suggesting that the lake
+was getting shallower and shallower. He has always been that inquisitive
+that I was sur-r-e he would make for that spot to find out why. I knew
+that all those poor-r young folks had to do was to meet. Keep him,
+Molly--and God bless you!"
+
+There was a little choking sound at the other end that Molly understood
+very well. She hung up the receiver "with a smile on her lip but a tear
+in her eye." It is all very well for a mother to be unselfish and want
+her son to marry and to be happy, but there is a tug of war going on in
+her heart all the time.
+
+"I know how I will feel when Dodo gets engaged," Molly said to Edwin
+when she told him of what Mrs. McLean had said; but that young father
+went off into such shouts of laughter, Molly had a feeling that mere man
+could never understand a mother's heart.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+PLANS
+
+
+"I have no idea of going through dinner without letting you and old Ed
+know all about us!" said Andy as he took his place at Molly's hospitable
+board.
+
+"What about you?" asked Molly, who was growing deceitful, her husband
+feared.
+
+"About Nance and me! I can't keep it any longer," declared the happy
+young doctor. Nance kept her eyes on her plate but her mouth was
+twitching with amusement.
+
+"What about you and Nance?" solemnly asked the professor.
+
+"Why, we're engaged!"
+
+"No! Not really?" and Edwin grinned.
+
+"Oh, Andy! I'm so glad!" and Molly reached a hand out to her two
+friends, who were perforce placed across the table from each other
+since there were only four for dinner.
+
+Nance got up and kissed her hostess. "Oh, Molly, you are too lovely!
+Don't you know that I know that Andy and I have not fooled you one
+moment? Don't I see brandy peaches on the side table all ready for
+dessert, and don't you know that I know that those precious articles are
+only brought out on highdays and holidays? Isn't that fruit cake I
+smell, that you know perfectly well you made and put away for next
+Christmas so it would be ripe and get better and better?"
+
+"Well, I had to express my feelings somehow, and how did I know that you
+and Andy were going to tell your secret this very evening? I knew I
+mustn't say a thing until you two said something, and if I could not say
+anything, I could at least feed you."
+
+"All I can say, Andy, is that if your experience in choosing a girl from
+that class of 19-- is as fortunate as mine, you will be a pretty happy
+man, and by Jove, I believe you are running me a mighty close second,"
+and to the astonishment of his wife, as Edwin Green was certainly a far
+from demonstrative man, he actually jumped from his seat and embraced
+Nance. Then Andy felt that he must kiss Molly, and Kizzie coming in at
+this juncture almost dropped the dish she was carrying.
+
+"Sich a-carryin's on I never seed. I'm a-thinking you folks had better
+sort yo'selves," and the girl went off chortling.
+
+"Now tell me your plans!" demanded Molly when they settled down to
+dinner. Strange to say, they had got rather mixed up in the promiscuous
+embracing that had been going on, and Edwin and Andy had changed places.
+Edwin found himself seated at Molly's side while Andy had greatly
+disarranged the table by plumping himself down by his Nance.
+
+"We are to be married immediately," announced Andy stoutly.
+
+Nance gasped. The fact was they had been so busy explaining the past and
+living in the present while the fire had died so low in the library,
+that the future had not been touched upon.
+
+"Of course I may start for France at any time now, but before I go I
+mean to get me a war bride. It will be pretty bad leaving her, but then
+the war can't last forever, and I have decided it is my duty to go help,
+and I fancy it still is. When Uncle Sam steps in, maybe he can finish up
+things in a hurry. Then I can get back to Nance."
+
+"Get back to me, indeed! If you think you are going without me, Andy
+McLean, you are vastly mistaken. If it is your duty to go help, it is my
+duty, too. Oh, I know I am no trained nurse, but I can do lots of other
+things. Dr. Flint says I am better than most trained nurses----"
+
+Nance stopped short. She should not have mentioned Dr. Flint. Only
+suppose it had hurt Andy's feelings! Not a bit of it!
+
+"Bully for Flint!" cried the accepted lover. "Oh, Nance, would you go
+with me?"
+
+"I can scrub and cook and take care of babies."
+
+"I don't know about that," teased Andy.
+
+"But you will always be near and pull them out of the water when I let
+them fall in," suggested Nance. "Won't you?"
+
+"That I will! Just as near as I can get!" and Andy hitched his chair a
+little closer, thereby disarranging the table even more than he had done
+before. But although Molly was a very careful housekeeper and most
+particular about the looks of her table, she cared not one whit, but
+beamed on Andy as though he were the pink of propriety instead of a
+naughty boy.
+
+What a change a little lovering had made in the appearance of both Nance
+and Andy! The girl's clear skin was flushed and her eyes sparkling. The
+corners of her mouth had no trace of downward tendency now. The years of
+sadness and confinement spent in nursing her father and mother were
+forgotten. Nance had come into her own--her woman's heritage: to be
+beloved, to be guarded and cherished; at the same time to know that she
+was to be the companion, the helpmeet. As for Andy,--he beamed with
+joy. His face had lost the stern lines that had so distressed his
+mother. He looked again like the boy he was, not like the tired,
+disappointed man she had known of late.
+
+Nance had no romantic notions of what life in France meant in that
+early spring of 1917. She knew that there was no room for drones and
+unproductive consumers in that war-worn country. She knew that in
+marrying Andy and going with his unit she was to face work, privations,
+danger, even death; but with her eyes open she was determined to see it
+through.
+
+"I would enlist in the United States army," Andy said to his host after
+dinner, as they lounged in the den and puffed away at their comforting
+pipes, "but I feel that I can be of more good right now in France where
+they are crying out for surgeons."
+
+"It can't be many days now before war is declared," sighed Edwin. "By
+jiminy! I hate myself for not being able to get in the game."
+
+"Too bad, old man! A fellow with a wife and two children has to think of
+them."
+
+"Of course! I wouldn't let Molly know how I feel about it for any
+thing. I am not so young as I was, but I am stronger now than I was as a
+youth. As for my eyes--they are good enough eyes in glasses and my bald
+head would be no drawback." Edwin always would call his sparsely covered
+top "bald," but Molly, by diligent care, had made two blades of grass
+grow where only one had grown before, and with a microscope one could
+see the beginnings of a fuzzy crop of hair, at least so the fond wife
+insisted.
+
+"I bet she would say go, if it were put to her," said Andy.
+
+"I'll not do it, though! It wouldn't be fair."
+
+"Well, if it is put up to her, I bet on Molly Brown!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+ALL THE OLD GIRLS
+
+
+"I've got a wonderful scheme, Edwin," said Molly when she had finally
+engineered her husband out of the den and Nance in.
+
+"I'll be bound you have. I never saw such a Mrs. Machiavelli!--First I
+mustn't go in the library but stick to the den, and now that I had just
+made myself at home in the den I must flee to the library."
+
+Molly laughed at her husband's pretended discomfiture as he settled
+himself to find out what was going on at the front.
+
+"Now read the news to me while I knit. There is no knowing how soon our
+own boys will be needing sweaters. I feel that every stitch I put in is
+important. Mercy, what a mess my knitting is in! I do believe that
+little monkey of a Mildred has been working on it. But she can't purl
+at all! Someone else has done it. No one has been here but Andy."
+
+"Well, I can't think Andy McLean would attempt a sweater," laughed
+Edwin. "Maybe Nance is responsible."
+
+"But Nance is a past master!"
+
+"She might have been trying a one-handed stunt and failed. I don't
+believe even Prussian efficiency could knit and get proposed to and
+accept all at the same time. Under the circumstances I think she should
+be forgiven for purling where she should have knitted and knitting where
+she should have purled."
+
+"You sound like the prayer book," said Molly, patiently pulling out
+stitches and deftly picking up where Andy asked to hold Nance's hand. "I
+almost feel as though I were committing a sacrilege. This sweater is
+like a piece of tapestry where the lady has recorded her emotions, using
+the medium she knew best. I just know dear old Nance tried to go on with
+her work all the time Andy was making love," and Molly wiped a wee tear
+off on the ball of yarn.
+
+"I tell you that sweater could tell tales if it could speak," teased
+Edwin. "Why don't you sew in one of your golden hairs so that the happy
+soldier who finally gets it will have some inkling of how the beautiful
+girl looks who made it?"
+
+"Silly! But don't you want to hear what my scheme is?"
+
+"Dying to!"
+
+"I am going to try to get the old Queen's girls, that is our 'special
+crowd, to come to Nance's wedding. Katherine and Edith Williams are both
+in New York; Judy is there; Otoyo Sen is in Boston; Margaret Wakefield
+is in Washington; Jessie Lynch is in Philadelphia----"
+
+"Are there no husbands?"
+
+"Oh, yes, plenty of them, but I'm not going to invite husbands! The
+babies can come if the mothers can't leave them, but the husbands are
+not invited. Katherine Williams and Jessie Lynch are the only ones who
+are still in single blessedness."
+
+"Are you going to have them all stay here?" asked Edwin in amazement,
+never having quite accustomed himself to Molly's wholesale hospitality.
+
+"Of course! I can manage it finely. That will be only six extra ones.
+Why, at Chatsworth we had that much company any time. This house is
+really almost as big as Chatsworth and there we had our huge family to
+put away besides."
+
+"All I can say is that you are a wonder, but please don't break yourself
+down over this wedding. What does Nance say to it?"
+
+"I haven't asked her, but I know she is dying to see all the girls
+together. We have often talked about it, and wedding or no wedding I was
+going to try to get them here this next month. Otoyo has already
+promised to come, you remember, and now she can just hurry up and get
+here for the wedding. She will have to bring Cho-Cho-San, who is just a
+bit older than Mildred. They can have great times together. You don't
+mind, do you, honey?"
+
+"Mind! Of course not! You know I like company. I was just afraid you
+were giving yourself too large an order."
+
+Nance, on being consulted, thought it would be wonderful to see all the
+old girls again before embarking on her great adventure, so letters were
+forthwith written and sent to the six friends, who one and all joyfully
+accepted. Business, husbands, babies, society were to be left behind for
+this grand reunion of the old Queen's crowd.
+
+Otoyo Sen, now Mrs. Matsuki, whose exceedingly regretfully but honorable
+husband was gone on short journey and baby Cho-Cho-San must stay with
+humble mother for the wedding. As Molly had expected to have the child,
+this was as it should be.
+
+Katherine had demanded leave from the lectures she was delivering, and
+Edith had an excellent nurse for her baby and could leave her family
+easily. Margaret Wakefield had no children and was able to cancel the
+many engagements that such an important person was sure to have, and her
+house was in such good running order that her husband, the rising young
+congressman, would want for nothing in her absence. Jessie Lynch had
+declined two luncheons, a dinner dance, and a theatre party, besides
+breaking as many more engagements in order to come to this wedding of
+the old college friend. Jessie was still unmarried although she had been
+the one that the prophecy had married off first. Pretty little Jessie
+had so many lovers it was hard to choose among them.
+
+The very first reply was from Judy and she, Judy-like, answered in
+person. She blew in at nightfall with a huge suitcase, many parcels and
+her gay chintz knitting bag stuffed full of various things besides
+knitting.
+
+"Kent was dying to come but I told him no children and dogs were
+allowed," announced that glowing young matron as she dropped her
+belongings, scattering them all over the library floor, and rushed
+around kissing and hugging everybody in the room. "I have come to help.
+I know you, Molly! You always act like triplets when there is any work
+on hand, and I know you, too, Nance! Your New England conscience will
+make you neglect Andy rather than seem to shirk work. I am here to sweep
+and dust and cook, take care of babies, or even to flirt with Andy if
+Nance does not look after him. I am going to dress the bride; find
+Edwin's collar buttons and studs for his dress shirt; see that the best
+man has the ring safe in his pocket; pay the preacher; put in the supply
+of rice and old shoes--in fact," she sang:
+
+    "'Oh, I am a cook and a captain bold,
+        And the mate of the Nancy brig,
+      And a bo'sun tight, and a midshipmite,
+        And the crew of the captain's gig.'"
+
+The Greens had been sitting quite sedately around the lamp engaged in
+their various occupations when Judy burst in on them. The professor was
+getting up a lecture for the morrow, Mildred was cutting out paper
+dolls, and Molly and Nance had for the moment put down their eternal
+knitting and were giving their attention to whipping on lace for the
+modest trousseau. But the whirlwind that came in swept aside all sane
+business. Needles were hastily thrust in cloth; thimbles were mislaid;
+paper dolls dropped for something livelier; and lecture preparation
+abandoned. When Judy, after the breathless announcement of having come
+and her reasons for coming, began on the Nancy Bell, Edwin sprang to his
+feet and, joining in the dance that Judy was improvising, sang in a
+rollicking mixture of tenor and baritone:
+
+    "'And he shook his fist and tore his hair,
+        Till I really felt afraid,
+      For I couldn't help thinking the man had been drinking,
+        And so I simply said:
+
+    "'Oh, elderly man, it's little I know
+        Of the duties of men of the sea,
+      And I'll eat my hand if I understand
+        However you can be
+
+    "'At once a cook and a captain bold,
+        And the mate of the Nancy brig,
+      And a bo'sun tight, and a midshipmite,
+        And the crew of the captain's gig.'"
+
+Little Mildred clapped her hands to see her dignified father cutting
+pigeon wings. She had yet to learn that dignity and Mrs. Kent Brown
+could not stay in the same room.
+
+"Oh, Judy! It is good to see you," gasped Molly when the chorus, in
+which all of them joined, had been sung over twice. "What a Judy you
+are, anyhow!"
+
+"Let me take your suitcase up-stairs," suggested Edwin.
+
+"And I will carry your parcels," insisted Nance, who was happy indeed
+over seeing her old college friend again.
+
+"There is not a bit of use in taking a thing up-stairs. All of my
+clothes are in the knitting bag. Those parcels are wedding presents and
+the suitcase is full of all kinds of plunder. This big bundle is a tea
+basket from Kent and me. You and Andy can go to housekeeping in it. We
+thought you would rather have it than silver or cut glass, since you are
+going where there are no side boards to speak of."
+
+"Oh, Judy, how splendid! It is exactly what I have been longing for,"
+cried Nance, opening the charming Japanese basket. "Only look, plates,
+cups and saucers, tea pot, coffee pot, sugar bowl, cream pitcher,
+spoons, knives, forks, cannisters for coffee, tea, sugar, crackers, hard
+alcohol stove, chafing dish and tea kettle! All packed in two square
+feet of basket!"
+
+"A regular kitchen cabinet!" declared Molly. "Nobody but Nance could
+ever get them packed again in the right place, I am sure, Nance and
+Otoyo, perhaps."
+
+"I just know Otoyo is going to bring her one like mine! I never thought
+of that when I got it. I saw it at Vantine's and simply fell in love
+with it. I wanted it so bad myself I got it for Nance. If Otoyo does
+bring one, I will exchange mine," said Judy generously.
+
+"Indeed no! I wouldn't mind having two one bit and I am certainly not
+going to give up my very first wedding present," blushed Nance.
+
+"Here is a steamer rug from dear old Mary Stuart. See how warm and soft
+it is! This is a pocket set of Shakespeare from Jimmy Lufton! He brought
+it to the train!"
+
+"But how lovely! I didn't dream of getting any presents," said Nance.
+
+"How did they know about Nance?" asked Molly.
+
+"I 'phoned them! I got your letter while Kent was at the armory so I
+just called up everybody I knew and told them the news. There is no
+telling what the excess calls will amount to, but I had either to do
+that or burst! 'Phoning is cheaper than bursting.
+
+"Now I bet you can't guess what is in this great round box," said the
+effervescent Judy.
+
+"Your wedding hat!" solemnly suggested Edwin.
+
+"Hat your grandmother! Guess again!"
+
+"A German bomb!"
+
+"No! Cold, cold! You'll never get it! It is a wedding cake sent by
+Madeline Petit and Judith Blount. Now what do you think of that?"
+
+"Wonderful!" cried Molly, as she lifted the cake from its careful
+packing. "Fruit cake with white icing! How on earth did they happen to
+do it?"
+
+"You see I 'phoned them, too, because I always did like little Madeline
+in spite of the fact that she talks a fellow's ear off. I am not so fond
+of Judith, but I do admire her. She has spunked up so splendidly and
+taken her medicine like a man. She and Madeline are doing a thriving
+business in a swell part of town with tea rooms and all kinds of fancy
+cakes. Judith was the one who suggested sending the cake, Madeline told
+me. She said Judith said she knew Molly Brown would work herself to
+death over the wedding and she, for one, was going to send something to
+help out Molly. She said you were just goose enough to make the cake at
+home."
+
+"I had planned to do it," laughed Molly. "I was going to start
+to-morrow."
+
+"This huge box is candy to eat right now--that is Kent! I am almost
+afraid to eat it. He wanted to come so bad that he might have poisoned
+it for spite."
+
+"Why didn't you let him come? Dear old Kent!" exclaimed Molly.
+
+"Well, I knew perfectly well that it is some job to sleep seven persons
+outside of one's own household, and it is doubly difficult when there
+are two sexes. Kent is as busy as can be anyhow: drilling day and
+night."
+
+Kent Brown had taken the training at Plattsburg and was then engaged in
+passing on this training to a company of militia in New York. He and
+Judy were eagerly awaiting the declaration of war by the United States.
+There was no such thing as neutrality for them. Having been in France in
+that August of 1914, Judy considered herself already at war and Kent
+enthusiastically shared the sentiments of his wife. He was prepared to
+leave his profession of architecture, in which he was proving himself
+very successful, and join any regiment that was likely to see service.
+
+Judy had done exactly what the Marquis d'Ochte had asked her to do: she
+had come back to New York and plunged into war relief work. Because of
+her enthusiasm and untiring energy she had been of great assistance in
+recruiting workers. Her admiring husband said that she was what one
+might call a real booster. Any campaign Judy plunged in was sure to be a
+whirlwind campaign. She had her father's capacity for infinite work. Up
+to a certain period it had evinced itself in the form of infinite play,
+but now that the serious side of life had presented itself to her, the
+girl was working quite as hard as she had ever played. There was never
+anything half-way about our Judy. In New York she was canvassing for
+suffrage, keeping up her painting, and with her own hands cutting and
+folding enough surgical dressings to fill the peace ship, besides
+rounding up many workers for the cause. With it all she managed to be a
+very satisfactory wife and housekeeper. She and Kent were blissfully
+happy. There were red letter days in their calendar when both of them
+stopped working and went on some mad frolic. They had made many friends
+in New York, friends with whom they both worked and played. They had a
+hospitable apartment where the redoubtable Ca'line reigned in the tiny
+kitchen, Ca'line, trained by Mrs. Brown at Chatsworth and chastened by
+dear old Aunt Mary until she "knowed her place an' kep' it."
+
+Isn't it fun to see Judy again? I hope my readers feel as glad for her
+to come bounding into these pages as the Greens and Nance Oldham did
+when she opened the door of the library at the Square Deal and,
+upsetting everything, scattered papers and parcels hither and yon, her
+vivid personality permeating every corner of the room.
+
+Just before Judy said good-night, she paused and exclaimed, "I must tell
+you, Molly, how much I enjoy the dear little Virginia girls you have
+passed on to me. The Tucker twins and Page Allison are just about the
+nicest girls I know, and Mary Flannagan is a duck. I used to be an awful
+snob about college girls,--somehow, I thought girls who did not go to
+college were not worth knowing, but I have changed my mind since I have
+met these girls. They are an interesting lot and as far as I can see
+know as much as we do."
+
+"I knew you would like them. I simply fell in love with them last spring
+in Charleston. Have you met their father?"
+
+"No, but he must be some father! The girls call him Zebedee, which
+appeals to me, having always called mine Bobby."
+
+"Zebedee? What a strange name!" said Nance.
+
+"They say it is because nobody ever believes he is their father and so
+they want to know: 'Who is the father of Zebedee's children?' It seems
+he is only about twenty years older than they are and is one of those
+persons who never gets on in years. They declare they are really more
+mature than he is and not nearly so agile," laughed Judy.
+
+"I have been meaning to ask them to Wellington and must certainly do it
+before they go back to Richmond," declared Molly, on hospitality bent as
+usual.
+
+"All right, honey, but let's get Nance safely married and the wedding
+feast disposed of," insisted Judy, who thought her brother-in-law looked
+a little alarmed, fearing that Molly might decide that this was as good
+a time as any to have the Tuckers and Page Allison visit them.
+
+"Of course! I didn't mean now but later on, although it is a pity to put
+it off too long," teased Molly, seeing the worried look on Edwin's face.
+"I might make up two bunks on the pantry shelves and let one of them
+sleep in the bath tub."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+AN INTERESTING COUPLE
+
+
+"I came from New York with a very interesting couple," said Judy the
+next day as she vigorously stitched away at some of the wedding finery.
+"Of course I talked to them--I always talk to the interesting persons I
+meet traveling."
+
+"So do I," said Molly as she finished a garment and put it aside for
+Kizzie to press.
+
+"I never do," sighed Nance. "I do wish I had some of your and Judy's
+warm-heartedness."
+
+"Nonsense! Your heart is just as warm as any that beats," objected
+Molly. "Ask Andy!"
+
+"You see, honey, Vermont is Vermont and Kentucky is Kentucky! Persons
+from Kentucky haven't quite as hard shells as the ones from Vermont, but
+when once you get below the shell the kernel is about the same. You and
+Molly couldn't be any more alike than Kentucky beeches and Vermont
+pines," said Judy, pausing long enough in her labors to give Nance an
+encouraging pat.
+
+"Yes, and pines stay green all the year around," said Molly. "It is much
+better to be a pine than a beech."
+
+"Well, tell us about the interesting couple," laughed Nance, much
+comforted.
+
+"They were from Alsace but were very French in their sympathies. They
+looked a little German but they spoke beautiful French except that they
+did have a tendency to call Paris 'Baree.' They love Paris as much as I
+do. The man, Misel is his name, Monsieur Jean Misel,--is the best
+informed person I have seen for many a day. He knows the war situation
+as few persons do, I am sure. He seems to have been everywhere and known
+everybody. He even knew my father,--at least, knew all about him and was
+greatly interested in the fact that Bobby is soon to sail for France to
+help rebuild the roads. Madame Misel is much quieter than her husband
+but is very intelligent, I am sure. With all her reserve, she never
+misses a trick."
+
+"Where was this interesting couple going?" asked Molly.
+
+"Coming right here to Wellington! They have taken a cottage in the
+village and mean to live here. He is writing and she wants to do war
+work."
+
+"How splendid!" cried Molly. "We need workers more than I can tell you.
+The students give what time they can, but a full college course is about
+all a normal girl can take care of in the way of work."
+
+"You must call on them right off, Molly. I will go with you and Edwin
+must go, too. I know he will like Monsieur Misel."
+
+"I'll ask him, but Edwin is sure to want to know why this lover of Paris
+is not fighting for France."
+
+"Ah, the poor fellow! He is quite lame--walks with a cane and a crutch.
+He hinted rather darkly that his lameness is in some way due to the
+Germans, but I do not know in just what way. He was sensitive about his
+affliction, so his wife told me when he left us and went in the smoker,
+so naturally I did not ask him how the Germans were responsible for it.
+He is a young man, too, that is under forty, and very handsome."
+
+Professor Green was quite interested in what Judy had to tell him of the
+Misels. He promised to call with Molly and do all he could to make
+Wellington pleasant for them. He looked forward with pleasure to the
+conversations Judy assured him he would enjoy with that highly educated
+gentleman. Holding the chair of English in a woman's college is not bad,
+but there were times when Edwin Green longed for more man talk. He and
+Dr. McLean were sworn friends and saw much of each other, but they both
+of them welcomed with enthusiasm any masculine newcomer.
+
+"I wonder if your friend could teach French, Judy," asked her
+brother-in-law. "Miss Walker is quite put to it for the end of the term.
+The French professor took French leave last week. He seemed too old to
+hold anything more weighty than a pen, but he has gone to fight."
+
+"That is the terrible part of it," sighed Judy. "They say all the
+superannuated dancing masters and French teachers are leaving to take up
+arms. It means that France is having a hard time. Why, oh why, don't we
+hurry up and get in the game?"
+
+The call was made and Molly and her husband were quite as enthusiastic
+as Judy had been over the charms of the new neighbors. Monsieur Misel
+seemed the very person to take up the labors of the flown French
+professor, and Miss Walker accordingly engaged him. Molly felt she must
+have them to dinner in spite of the fact that she was deep in the
+preparations for the wedding.
+
+"I'll have a very simple dinner and not make company of them, just make
+them feel at home," she declared, and her husband and Nance and Judy
+smiled knowingly. Molly always would have company and there was no use
+in trying to stop her.
+
+"I know when I die she will feel called upon to give me a good wake,"
+laughed Edwin.
+
+"Certainly, if people come hungry to your funeral, I'll feed them,"
+answered Molly.
+
+"Are our new friends, the Misels, hungry?"
+
+"Not hungry for food, but they must be lonely so far away from their
+country and friends. Anyhow, they are invited now and have accepted, so
+there is no use in teasing me. You just see that there are cigars here
+for Monsieur Misel to smoke after dinner, and I'll attend to the rest."
+
+How sad it was to see a man of Misel's beauty a hopeless cripple! He was
+a tall, stalwart fellow with a military bearing which the use of a
+crutch and cane could not take from him. His lameness had not affected
+the comeliness of his limbs or his erect carriage. He had very courteous
+manners and it seemed to be very hard on him not to spring from his seat
+when a lady entered the room.
+
+On the evening of Molly's informal dinner when Nance, who was the only
+member of the household who had not met the strangers, came into the
+library, Misel stood up to be introduced, but his wife gave a low cry of
+alarm and sprang to his assistance, eagerly placing his crutch in one
+hand, his cane in the other. He sank to his seat with a smothered groan.
+
+"Jean, Jean! What am I to do with you?" said Madame Misel irritably. "He
+is so imprudent," apologetically to Molly, who had tears in her eyes at
+this exhibition of courage and weakness. She could well understand how
+Monsieur Misel's courteous desires could get the better of his strength.
+
+Andy McLean was present and the doctor in him immediately became
+interested in the pitiable case. He had none of the hesitation Judy had
+shown in regard to questioning the Misels concerning the cause of the
+lameness.
+
+"What is your trouble?" he asked bluntly. "If you can stand without
+support as you did a moment ago, I see no reason why you cannot be
+cured."
+
+"In time! In time!" said Misel with patient resignation.
+
+"He has had the best medical attention," put in his wife.
+
+Madame Misel usually spoke with a kind of slow hesitation, but now her
+words came rapidly. She had the air of trying to shield her husband from
+farther questioning on the part of Andy. Andy, however, was totally
+oblivious of this fact and went on.
+
+"Who is his surgeon?"
+
+"The great F----, in Baree!"
+
+"What did he say?" asked Andy, impressed by the name.
+
+"He--he--said--nerve centres--disturbed," answered Madame, returning to
+her hesitating speech. She did not stammer at all but seemed to pause to
+choose her words.
+
+"If I can be of any assistance to you, I hope you will call on me," said
+Andy kindly.
+
+In the meantime Misel sat with his hands over his eyes as though in
+great pain and his wife hovered over him solicitously.
+
+Dinner was soon announced and this time the lame man arose very
+cautiously and made his way slowly to the dining-room.
+
+"Kindly--go--in--front--of--us," faltered Madame, and Molly marshalled
+her family and guests so that the Misels might bring up the rear. She
+fully appreciated how the wife felt about wanting to be the one to
+assist her poor lame husband. If her Edwin had been so crippled no one
+should have helped him but his own wife.
+
+Molly turned to smile on the poor woman for whom her heart was sore. She
+could well understand the misery it must bring to see one most dear
+having to suffer so acutely. There was a dark place in the hall leading
+to the dining-room and the hostess feared the poor lame man might
+stumble there, so she stopped to warn him of a rug. She distinctly heard
+Madame say to her husband in no gentle tones but with an asperity almost
+malevolent:
+
+"_Narr! Narr!_"
+
+Molly began assiduously to hunt in the archives of her brain for the
+small German vocabulary which she could call her own.
+
+"_Narr!_ What can _narr_ mean?" the question kept recurring to her as
+dinner progressed. She visualized lists of words in a worn old blank
+book used at school. "_Narr_, _Nase_, _Nesse_, _Nest_!" She tried to
+remember the English on the opposite page. How well she remembered the
+little old book wherein was written the despised German exercises. The
+script in itself had been almost impossible to learn and as for
+mastering the language,--she had been so half-hearted about it that she
+had not been compelled to keep it up.
+
+"_Narr_, _nase_, _nesse_, _nest_!" ran through and through and over and
+over in her mind. Suddenly just as Professor Green asked her what she
+would say to adjourning to the library, the list of English words
+flashed on her brain.
+
+"'Fool, nose, nephew, nest'!" she cried audibly.
+
+"What?" Edwin feared his Molly had gone crazy.
+
+"Oh--I--I--mean, yes--coffee in the library!" and she arose from her
+seat in confusion.
+
+Why should that calm-looking, slow-speaking woman call her poor lame
+husband a fool? _Narr! Narr!_ It was certainly strange.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+AN OLD-TIME PARTY
+
+
+The first one of the old girls to arrive was Otoyo, Mrs. Matsuki, with
+the little Cho-Cho-San. Otoyo had changed not at all in the years that
+had elapsed since college days. Perhaps an added matronly dignity was
+hers, but this was not much in evidence when she was with her dear old
+friends. She was beautifully and elegantly dressed. All her clothes were
+made of the most exquisite fabrics. Her blouses were of the finest and
+sheerest, if of linen; and the heaviest and richest, if of silk. Her
+furs were the furriest and her suits of the most approved cut and
+material. Her little boots were a marvel of fit and style.
+
+"Perfect, like a Japanese puzzle!" Judy declared. "Every little part
+made to fit every other little part!"
+
+"Yes, and the whole a wonderful creation like some rare print or bit of
+pottery!" agreed Molly.
+
+Otoyo had adapted herself to the manners and customs of her adopted
+country, wearing them with the same grace she did the garments. She had
+an English nurse for the little Cho-Cho-San and the child was being
+reared as much like American children as possible. A tiny little thing,
+she was, with coal black hair and slanting eyes. There was much mischief
+peeping from those eyes around the tip-tilted nose. The mouth was a
+crimson bow, ever ready to break into a tinkling laugh. She and Mildred
+rushed together as though their short lives had been spent waiting for
+this opportunity. Mildred was younger by several months but taller by
+several inches than the little Japanese. What a picture the two children
+made! Mildred, with her red gold hair curling in little ringlets all
+over her head, her round rosy face and wide hazel eyes, was exactly the
+opposite to Cho-Cho-San, with her straight, bobbed, ebony black hair,
+her oval, olive face and almond eyes.
+
+"I b'lieve I can tote you," said Mildred, who often used words current
+in Kizzie's vernacular.
+
+"Tote! Tote! What is tote?" and the tinkling laugh rang out like glass
+chimes assailed by a sudden gust of wind.
+
+"Why I tote my dolly--an' Mr. Murphy totes the coal--an'--an' Daddy
+totes his books to lexures--an'--an'--"
+
+"May I tote something, also?"
+
+"Oh, yes, you can tote Dodo. He's my baby brother."
+
+"Oh, I'm so 'appee! I'm so 'appee!" and the little thing danced in glee.
+"My honorable mother told me when I came for a visit to her friends that
+it would be all 'appiness." The English nurse had left her stamp upon
+her charge just as Kizzie had upon Mildred. The occasional dropping of
+an h was the result. Cho-Cho-San's lingo was most amusing with its
+mixture of Cockney and Japanese.
+
+"You'd look 'zactly like my Jap dolly if you only had a bald spot on
+top," said Mildred as she led her new friend to the sunny nursery where
+she and Dodo reigned supreme with the Irish Katy to do their bidding.
+
+"And phwat Haythen is this?" cried Katy when she saw the little Japanese
+girl. "And ain't she the cutey?"
+
+"She's my bes' beloved," announced Mildred. "Me'n' Cho-Cho-San is gonter
+be each other's doll babies. I'm a-gonter be her kick-up dolly an' she's
+gonter be my Jap dolly."
+
+"Oh, I'm so 'appee! I'm so 'appee!" was all the tiny Haythen could say
+as she danced around the nursery.
+
+"Aunt Nance done said we could be her flower girls, too," went on the
+loquacious Mildred. "We's all gonter get married day after another day."
+
+"All the doll babies going to be married!" sang the guest. "Kick-up
+dolls and Japanese dolls!"
+
+The Williams girls arrived next and close on their heels Margaret and
+Jessie. I cannot bring myself to designate the girls by their married
+names any more than they could one another. Husbands were not much in
+evidence at that gathering. The talk was all of the past. Of course
+Andy, the soon-to-be husband, was allowed some consideration, although
+the first night after the arrival of the guests even he was debarred and
+the old chums had a kimono party in the library. The host fortunately
+had an engagement that took him from home, otherwise he would have had
+to spend his evening shut up in his den.
+
+The revellers opened the ball by singing "Drink her down," to each one
+in the crowd. Molly's old guitar was brought out and Otoyo produced a
+tiny ukelele which added much to the harmony. After the singing was
+finished and every one drunk down, the words that were used most often
+were: "Do you remember?" All of the scrapes were recalled and talked
+over. Bits of gossip were recounted that had never come to light before,
+the noblesse oblige of the college spirit having kept matters dark, but
+now that the years had rolled by there seemed to be no longer reason for
+silence.
+
+"I'd like to get into some mischief this very night!" cried Judy. "I've
+been good and pious so long I feel like whooping life up a bit."
+
+"I'm game," drawled Katherine Williams.
+
+"Did I hear an aye from the eminent educator?" questioned Judy.
+
+"That's me!"
+
+"I'll do whatever it is if I don't have to walk too far," said lazy
+Jessie.
+
+"But what are you to do?" from Margaret, in whom the spirit of adventure
+was not so rampant.
+
+"Listen to the Gentleman from Missouri!" cried Judy. "Come on and we'll
+show you."
+
+"I like very muchly to be in the vehicle of musicians but I also like
+muchly to know what is the ultimately destination," said Otoyo softly.
+
+"She means the band wagon! She means the band wagon!" cried Judy. "Oh,
+my dear little Otoyo, if you were changed I could not bear this sad grey
+world."
+
+"Others, too, have notly changed," said Otoyo slyly.
+
+"What are you planning, Judy honey?" asked Molly, laughing.
+
+"I haven't any plan--nothing but something crazy and adventurous. I am
+dead tired of being so good and proper. I have rolled bandages and drawn
+threads and cut gauze until I feel like a machine. I want to have a
+romantic adventure. I'd like to put a tick-tack on Miss Walker's
+window--I'd like to burn asafetida on the teacher's stove, or put red
+pepper in the Bible so when she opens it to read she would sneeze her
+head off. I might content myself with making an apple pie bed for my
+dear brother-in-law----"
+
+"Oh, please not that!" begged Molly. "My supply of sheets is stretched
+to the limit."
+
+"O. Henry would advise you to go out in the night and await Adventure.
+Adventure is always just around the corner. Step up to him and tap him
+on the shoulder," suggested Katherine.
+
+"It is very comfortable in here," purred Jessie.
+
+"Infirm of purpose!" cried Judy.
+
+"Well, I'm not infirm of purpose," said Molly. "I've been purposing all
+along to have a Welsh rarebit and make some cloudbursts and I'm still
+going to do it. If you Don Quixotes want to go off and hunt trouble in
+the meantime, though, you are welcome, only don't stay too long."
+
+"Ain't Molly the broad-minded guy, though? Live and let live was always
+Molly. Aren't you coming, Nance?" And Judy sprang from her cross-legged
+position on the rug ready for any fray. "Come on, Margaret! Come on,
+Edith."
+
+"Don't you know Edith is too stuffy to do such a thing? She's afraid her
+perfectly good husband would not approve," teased her sister.
+
+"No such thing, but I'm not going. I mean to help Molly. You crazy kids
+go get in all the trouble you want to. Me for the house this night!"
+
+"And Margaret? You, too, must keep the 'home fires burning,' I fancy."
+
+"I am going to stir the rarebit," announced Margaret firmly.
+
+"I'm going to pick out nuts for the cloudbursts," purred Jessie.
+
+"I must whip lace," blushed Nance.
+
+"Oh, you middle-aged persons! I bite my thumb at you!" cried Judy. "Who
+among you is young enough to go hunt adventure?"
+
+"I told you I intended to go," said Katherine, looking rather longingly
+at the crowded shelves of poetry that she was simply dying to poke in.
+"No one is going to call me middle-aged."
+
+"And I, too, will take greatly pleasure to knock the kindling from the
+shoulder of Adventure," said little Otoyo.
+
+"She means the chip! She means the chip!" screamed the delighted Judy.
+"Oh, Otoyo, I love you in all the world next to my immediate family!"
+
+It took but a moment to slip on great coats over kimonos and then,
+heavily veiled, the three adventuresses started forth, with admonitions
+from Molly not to be gone more than half an hour.
+
+"And please don't get arrested!" she called after them. "Kent says he
+always expects Judy to get arrested some day. This spirit of adventure
+seizes her every now and then and nothing will stop her."
+
+"It is well it struck her here at Wellington instead of in New York. She
+can't get into very much mischief here," laughed Edith.
+
+"She could in the old days," put in Margaret, "but now that she is not
+compelled to keep rules I fancy she will not care to break them. What a
+Judy she is! It must be great to have her in the family, Molly."
+
+"Indeed it is! She is the favorite in-law with the whole lot of Browns.
+Mother adores her and all the boys think she is just about perfect. Even
+Aunt Clay can't help liking her."
+
+"I wonder what they will find to-night. I almost wish I had left the
+lace off of this old camisole and gone with them," said Nance.
+
+"I think you need not hunt adventure right now," drawled Jessie. "Any
+girl who is deliberately getting married and going to the war zone will
+have enough to keep her busy for a lifetime. I don't believe they will
+do more than go to the drug store and get limeades."
+
+"You don't know Judy and Katherine," said Edith, "and little Otoyo with
+her determination to knock the kindling from the shoulder of Adventure.
+I wonder what Mr. Matsuki would say if he could know that his sedate
+little wife is engaged in such a harum scarum pursuit."
+
+"Why, he would just smile and bow and look more like an ivory Buddha
+than ever. Otoyo has the charming little gentleman completely under her
+thumb. She works a kind of mental jiu jitsu on him and he just lets her
+have her way. The joke of it is he thinks she is the most docile,
+obedient little wife in all the world, and so she is. She simply makes
+him want what she wants," explained Molly.
+
+Molly was busily engaged in the preparations for the midnight feast. It
+would have been simpler and easier just to have gone to the kitchen and
+made the rarebit over the gas stove, but that would not have been at all
+like college days and this night must be as near a reproduction of
+those times as possible. Chafing dishes must be used and dishes must be
+scarce or the spell would be broken.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+ADVENTURE
+
+
+It was after ten o'clock as the three veiled figures glided from the
+square house on the campus. The night was dark, fit for the deed they
+had to do. They did not know what the deed was but whatever it was the
+intrepid females were fully prepared to do it.
+
+"First we'll go by Prexy's house and perchance she may see us and then
+we'll run. That will be fun!" suggested Judy. "Nothing would so warm my
+old blood as to be taken for a junior."
+
+It so happened that a consultation was being held at the president's
+home and as they passed, Miss Walker opened the front door and Professor
+Green emerged.
+
+"Ministers and saints defend us! My brother-in-law!" cried Judy.
+
+"Who is that?" called Miss Walker as the three girls ran swiftly out of
+the broad band of light pouring from the open door.
+
+"Run for your lives!" hissed Judy.
+
+"Shall I chase them?" laughed Professor Green. "I'd much rather not."
+
+"No," sighed poor Prexy. "I fancy they are up to no harm, but it is late
+for girls to be out alone. Such terrible things seem to be happening all
+over the world. I'll have to deliver a lecture to the whole student
+body, I am afraid, about late rambles and pranks."
+
+"Those girls were veiled, so evidently whatever they were doing they did
+not want to be recognized. I'd hate to hold your job, Miss Walker. I'd
+much rather be the humble professor of English."
+
+"Surely it is not a sinecure," laughed the president, "but when all is
+told, my girls are a pretty good lot. Their mischief is never, at least
+hardly ever, serious. How glad I am to see Judy Kean again,--Mrs. Kent
+Brown! She is the same old Judy. Such pranks as that child could play!
+I shall never forget when she dyed her hair purple-black."
+
+"Judy is a great girl. I am glad we married into the same family,"
+declared the professor. "But tell me, Miss Walker, how Misel is doing.
+I feel quite responsible for him since it was I who introduced him to
+you."
+
+"The students like him. He seems to be able to impart knowledge. I am
+afraid he is too handsome, however. It isn't quite safe to have a
+professor too good-looking. College girls are very impressionable."
+Then Miss Walker realized she had made quite a break. Edwin Green
+was certainly a very good-looking man but not the type to make girls
+languish with love. While M. Misel was a much more romantic figure with
+his flashing eyes and lameness.
+
+"Are the girls losing their hearts to him?" laughed Edwin. "Again I am
+thankful I am what I am and not what others are."
+
+And so the two old friends chatted in the doorway while the three veiled
+figures made their way towards the village.
+
+"We got them going that time," panted Judy after the run through the
+dark. "I bet you anything Prexy lectures the girls to-morrow morning.
+Dear Prexy!"
+
+"Let's tick-tack the math teacher. I bet you she's still out of bed
+thinking up deviltry to make the girls miserable with on the morrow,"
+suggested Katherine.
+
+"I can make a noise very muchly like a cat. Would not that be as
+gruesomely as a mathematicktack? We might be the Musicians of Bremen, as
+one reads in the beautifully fairy story."
+
+"Fine, Otoyo! Here's her domicile! Cut loose!" whispered Judy. "I'll be
+the donkey and Katherine crow like the rooster."
+
+Crouched down under the window where a light still burned for the much
+abused teacher of mathematics, the Musicians of Bremen, all but the dog,
+got ready for their song. The noise was something shocking. Judy's bray
+was so lifelike that little Otoyo sprang aside as though in fear of
+kicking hind legs.
+
+A dog in the neighborhood, feeling that harmony could be established by
+his voice alone, joined in the chorus.
+
+Windows were opened on the campus! Silence reigned supreme!
+
+"Don't run!" whispered Judy. "Scrooge down close to the wall."
+
+"Who is there?" called the math teacher.
+
+Mr. Dog went on howling as though he had been responsible for the whole
+infernal racket. His timely tact seemed to satisfy the curious ones and
+windows were closed, lights went out and the campus took itself off to
+bed.
+
+"Once more for luck!" commanded Great Commander Judy.
+
+"Practice makes perfect," so this time the Musicians of Bremen outdid
+themselves. Otoyo made a most wonderful pussy; Maud Adams herself could
+not have been a more realistic chanticler than Katherine; and Judy's
+donkey was so good that one could almost see the ears wagging as her
+great bray made night hideous.
+
+"Now run before they have a chance to open their windows!" and Judy was
+up and off in the darkness with the two other girls close on her heels.
+
+"I bet you investigating will go on at a great rate to-morrow," gasped
+Katherine, as after leaving the college grounds they came to the
+outskirts of the village.
+
+"It was so funnily," giggled Otoyo. "We must amusement make for the
+smally Mildred and Cho-Cho when the to-morrow has come."
+
+"I can't believe I am a full-fledged teacher in a model modern school in
+our great metropolis," said Katherine. "I feel just exactly like a
+schoolgirl,--not even a college girl. I know I could run a mile and
+there is no mischief I would not welcome."
+
+"I tooly!" agreed Otoyo. "It seems but a dream that I have honorable
+husband and smally babee, Cho-Cho. I feel like badly naughtily Japanese
+girl in masque."
+
+"Well, it is surely great to be a boy again just for to-night," declared
+Judy.
+
+"What next?" asked Katherine.
+
+"Next will be our great adventure! This has been only in the foothills
+of happenings. Soon we will have something really great come to us,"
+encouraged the captain.
+
+The village was well-lighted on the principal street, but that the girls
+avoided and crept down the side streets where all was quiet and almost
+dark, except at the corners where small gas-posts sent out feeble rays
+of light. They passed comfortable homes surrounded by large yards where
+the elite of Wellington lived. The elite were evidently a well-behaved
+lot, as they were all safely bestowed in bed, sleeping the sleep of the
+just as our naughty girls crept in front of their spacious mansions.
+
+Next to the great, came the near great: a row of pleasant cottages,
+each one with its little garden separated from its neighbor's by neat
+whitewashed palings. After these, they approached a cottage set in a
+large yard and isolated as much as if it were in the country. It was
+well back from the street and instead of the white palings of its
+neighbors, it boasted a box hedge about five feet high and at least
+three feet broad. Generations of close clipping had made this hedge as
+solid as a brick wall. The yard enclosed was laid out as a formal garden
+with box labyrinth and winding paths. In the rear was a summer-house
+with stone pillars covered with ivy. Two stone benches were on each side
+in this quaint house where no doubt dead and gone lovers had sat and
+perhaps caught rheumatism. Box bushes were placed at the four sides of
+the garden and these had been cut to represent armchairs by some zealous
+gardener long since passed away. The modern shears had but followed the
+lines of the original ones and the armchairs were still there although
+somewhat lopsided and hazy in drawing. There was the sun-dial and a
+snub-nosed stone Hebe who held aloft her little pitcher with a cup in
+the other hand ready to serve the Gods with imperceptible nectar.
+
+Our girls' eyes had become accustomed to the darkness and they peeped
+over the hedge (at least Katherine and Judy did, poor little Otoyo was
+too short), plainly discerning the charming ensemble of the little
+formal garden.
+
+"There, Adventure awaits us!" said Katherine melodramatically.
+
+"I want muchly to see," pleaded Otoyo. So Judy lifted her up for a peep.
+
+"I believe that is where the Misels live," said Judy. "It looks quite
+different at night, but I'm almost sure it is the place. Molly and I
+called at dusk and we came up on the other side, but I think it is this
+cottage. Isn't it lovely? I am so sorry for them, they do seem so
+friendless, somehow. Madame is already working for the Red Cross. Molly
+says she can make surgical dressings faster than anybody she ever saw.
+She takes them home and does them and brings them back so neatly folded
+and tied up that they think it is perfect foolishness to inspect them.
+They are sure there will be no mistakes where such a careful worker is
+on the job. M. Misel is so lame he can hardly locomote."
+
+"Let's go in their garden and sit down a little while," suggested
+Katherine, who but a few moments before had declared she could run a
+mile. The sedentary life as a teacher had not improved her wind. Her
+spirits might have been those of a schoolgirl but her endurance was
+equal only to a full-fledged teacher in a model school.
+
+They passed through the small green turnstile and silently crept around
+the labyrinth to the summer-house. The three girls sank on one of the
+cold stone benches and peered out into the picturesque garden. Their
+veils were raised but ready to be pulled down at a moment's notice.
+
+"Ghosts might walk in such a garden," whispered Judy.
+
+"The bench is coldly like a ghost," shivered Otoyo.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+AS SEEN FROM THE SUMMER-HOUSE
+
+
+"And now, Adventure, come forth!" commanded Katherine in sepulchral
+tones.
+
+The side door of the cottage, leading to the garden, now opened as
+though at Katherine's orders, and a broad ribbon of light fell across
+the labyrinth, picking out the snub-nosed Hebe and the sun-dial and one
+of the box chairs to illuminate. A man's figure was silhouetted in the
+doorway, a figure so beautiful that the artist in Judy gasped. He had on
+running togs which exposed his clean-cut limbs and shapely shoulders. A
+woman stood beside him and Judy recognized the outline of Madame Misel.
+The Greek god of a man was strange to her, although there was something
+familiar about the poise of his head on its column-like neck.
+
+The woman spoke in German in a low clear voice. Judy and Katherine both
+knew German fairly well and Otoyo had some knowledge of it. They heard
+Madame Misel say distinctly:
+
+"It is wiser if you wait until midnight for the exercises. Some of these
+blockheads might be out."
+
+"Oh, absurd!" answered the man. "There is no one in this whole stupid
+place with the spirit to be from under cover after ten. I am cramped
+enough and must run and leap. Stand aside!"
+
+"Misel, himself!" gasped Judy. Where were his crutch and cane and his
+lame back?
+
+The girls sat as still as the stone Hebe. It was inky black in their
+corner of the summer-house where they cowered, not afraid at all but
+ready to knock the chip from the shoulder of Adventure. Judy's first
+instinct on recognizing Madame Misel was to make herself known and
+explain their presence in her garden at such a late hour, but the
+realization that Misel was the man in running togs, which usually means
+running, glued her to her bench. What did it all mean?
+
+The door was shut and then Misel began a series of exercises of which
+any circus actor might have been proud. He began by leaping over the
+clipped hedge of the labyrinth,--back and forth with most surprising
+gyrations. It was so dark that it was difficult to follow his every
+movement, and so rapid were his leaps and bounds that he was now here,
+now there before eyes could be focussed to take in the impression. Then
+almost without the girls realizing what had happened, he had cleared the
+five-foot hedge and was out on the deserted street running like a deer.
+
+"Quick, before he is back!" gasped Judy, and the seekers for sensations
+were out of the garden and through the little turnstile in not much more
+time than it had taken the master of the house to leap the hedge.
+
+Without a word they hastened back to the college grounds. As they turned
+a corner, they ran plump into Misel, who seemed to have let off steam
+enough to be trotting contentedly home. They need not have feared him.
+He was much more anxious to escape from them than they were from him.
+He turned and ran like the wind in the opposite direction.
+
+"Gee, I wish we could have tripped him up!" exclaimed Judy.
+
+"And I might have jiu jitsued him most neatlily," put in little Otoyo.
+"I think he is what you might call a traitor-r-r."
+
+"I was never more excited in my life. What will the girls think when we
+tell them of what has happened to us?" panted Katherine.
+
+"Do you realize we have run against a tremendous thing?" said Judy
+soberly. "Almost international importance! I fancy we must keep kind of
+quiet about it. Of course we will tell Molly and Edwin and the girls,
+but I have an idea this thing will have to be worked up slowly and
+cautiously. I bet you it will be a case of secret service men and enemy
+aliens and what not. Why should Misel have pretended to be lame? Why
+should they come to live at Wellington? Why--a million whys about the
+whole matter!"
+
+"One thing:--Misel thought we were college girls on a lark and he will
+have no fear of our saying we met him or anyone outside the campus at
+such an hour," said Katherine wisely.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+THE PROFESSOR AT A KIMONO PARTY
+
+
+The Welsh rarebit was just assuming its required thickness and
+smoothness and the toast was done to a turn ready to receive its
+libation of cheese, when the wanderers came pattering in.
+
+"Where is Edwin?" demanded Judy.
+
+"In his den! You see this is a kimono party and gentlemen are not
+admitted," said Molly, helping Judy off with her coat and veil. "Now
+tell us all about it! Something has happened, I can see by your eyes and
+hair."
+
+"Happened! I should say it has! Something has bounced! Call Edwin! I
+don't give a hang if we are in kimonos! I'll be bound he does not know
+a kimono from a ball gown--I can't tell it twice."
+
+"Otoyo and I are not dumb. We might help out when you fall by the
+wayside," laughed Katherine, "but I, for one, don't mind the professor."
+
+"Nor I! Nor I!" chorused the others.
+
+"I think mine is vastly becoming," Jessie whispered to Margaret, who
+called her a vain puss.
+
+Edwin came in, rather pleased at being admitted and being allowed to
+have some of the party.
+
+"I never expected to get in on a fudge party," he said, contentedly
+settling himself by Judy, who was bursting with news.
+
+"Now begin!" commanded Margaret, rapping for order in much the old
+manner of class president and presiding officer.
+
+"Begin at the beginning!" begged Edith.
+
+"Well, first we went by Prexy's, just to get the feeling of youth back
+in our veins. She saw us, but we chased by."
+
+"So it was you! I wish I had run you down," cried the brother-in-law.
+
+"It is a blessing you did not or a good story would have been ruined,"
+said Katherine.
+
+Margaret rapped for order and Judy took up the tale.
+
+"Then we went to call on Mattie Math. She was burning the midnight oil,
+at least the 10 P. M. oil, and when we acted the Musicians of Bremen,
+she threw up the sash."
+
+"The hash? What hash?" asked Jessie, who often arrived a bit late.
+Shrieks and more rappings from Margaret.
+
+"My, how much I have missed in never being asked to a kimono party
+before," whispered the male guest in Judy's ear.
+
+"After we had brayed and crowed and meouwed and a dog had barked for
+us----"
+
+"All together!" cried Katherine, and the musicians gave a sample of
+their performance, Mrs. Matsuki outdoing all cats by her lifelike
+caterwauling.
+
+"After that, we went silently down to the village."
+
+"I don't believe it, not silently!" asserted Edwin.
+
+"No interruptions from the minority! We went silently down to the
+village, veils down, steps stealthy, eyes open and mouths shut. The
+garden at the Misels' was most inviting in its sweetness and beauty. Of
+course we wanted to go in and rest on the nice warm stone benches, so we
+walked through the turnstile and seated ourselves in the little dark
+summer-house, there to await Adventure."
+
+"Bang! Adventure comes stalkingly in!" cried Otoyo.
+
+"Leaping was more like it!" from Katherine.
+
+"Yes! Who should come springing from the side door, totally oblivious of
+us, but Misel, stripped for running and looking like a detail from a
+Greek frieze!"
+
+"Monsieur Misel! Why, Judy, you are mad! Misel is so lame he can't stand
+alone without crutch and cane!" cried Molly.
+
+"Lame your grandmother! He is a perfect circus actor. I have never seen
+a private citizen with such control of his muscles. He actually turned
+somersaults over the hedge in the labyrinth, walked on his hands better
+than I can on my feet, and cleared the five-foot hedge that borders the
+street with as much ease as--as--I eat this fudge," reaching for another
+piece.
+
+"But, Judy, are you sure it was he?" asked Edwin excitedly.
+
+"Of course I am sure!" And then Judy repeated the conversation they had
+overheard between Misel and his wife. "My German is shady when I have to
+use it, but I can understand very well."
+
+"So can I," declared Katherine.
+
+"And while I am constructionally verily faultily, I comprehend can,"
+said Otoyo, so excited that she ran off to adverb forms as was her wont
+in times of stress.
+
+"This is serious," said Edwin solemnly. "So serious that I feel I must
+do something about it and do it immediately. What time is it, honey?" he
+asked Molly.
+
+"Eleven-fifty! Why, what can you do? Not go fight Misel--not that!"
+
+"No, not that, at least not that yet, although I should like to break
+his lying crutch over his traitorous head. I must get in touch with the
+Secret Service. War will be declared any day now and Germany is getting
+busy even in quiet Wellington."
+
+"You forget Exmoor College is so near," put in Margaret. "Our college
+boys will officer the new army in part. I'll wager anything that this
+man has already begun his pacifist propaganda here in Wellington and at
+Exmoor, too. Has he been to Exmoor?"
+
+"Why, certainly! He got me to take him over and introduce him, the
+beast!" stormed Edwin. "Please pack my little grip for me, honey," he
+asked, drawing Molly to him. "I can catch the twelve-forty to New York.
+Don't give out that I am away. We had better do a little camouflage act
+of our own. I am ill, very ill! That will do! Let it be--what shall it
+be?"
+
+"Mumps!" cried Edith.
+
+"Not mumps, please!" cried Jessie. "Nothing contagious or we might catch
+it!"
+
+"Or worse than that, even, be quarantined!" laughed Nance.
+
+"Pretty hard on you, honey, as it would stop the ceremony," suggested
+Molly.
+
+"What do you usually have when you have anything?" asked Margaret with
+her judicial manner.
+
+"Neuralgia!"
+
+"Then neuralgia would be the natural thing to have when you have not
+anything."
+
+"Of course! Then, Molly, all day to-morrow your poor husband is ill with
+neuralgia. Not even the servants and children must come in my darkened
+room. I'll be home in the night and wake up the next morning feeling
+much better," and Molly hurried off to pack the grip.
+
+"In time to give the bride away!" suggested Judy.
+
+"May I tell Andy all about it?" asked Nance shyly.
+
+"Of course! We would not be so cruel as to make you start out with a
+secret from your lord and master," said Edwin.
+
+"It makes me so mad to think how kind Andy was to that man, offering his
+medical services to him and what not. I know the brutes had a good
+laugh over his gullibility. Andy told me afterwards that he could not
+understand the case, and if the man wasn't shamming, it was the most
+peculiar thing he had ever seen: the way he jumped up out of his chair
+when he was so lame."
+
+"Now I remember that very night that I heard Madame Misel call her
+husband a fool on the way into the dining-room. I had forgotten all
+about it until this minute. I kept wondering what she meant," said
+Molly.
+
+"I tell you they are deep ones," put in Katherine.
+
+"Not a bit of it!" stormed Judy. "They are the worst of all fools
+because they think no one else has any sense. Bobby, my beloved parent,
+always says that is the worst kind of fool. That the wise man, who wants
+to put over anything, must go to work with the idea that all the persons
+he wants the scheme to get by with have as much and more sense than he
+has. Now these Huns think they are the only pebbles on the beach and
+take for granted that they are dealing with children and fools, and as
+a rule they get caught up with."
+
+"Not before they do lots of damage, however," said Nance.
+
+"I hope in this instance their machinations have not done any," said
+Edwin devoutly. "Be sure and give the Misels no inkling they are
+suspected. All of you remember to be as polite as usual to them if you
+happen to run across them."
+
+"I'll try, but it will surely go against the grain," said Judy, her eyes
+flashing.
+
+"Prove your father's statements, dear little sister, and we shall let
+these foreigners know that we are not the blockheads they call us."
+
+"Also we are not the sleepily heads that must go bedwardly at such
+earlyly hour," and little Otoyo opened her almond eyes very wide to show
+that she at least would neither slumber nor sleep until the enemies to
+her country and her adopted country were safely caught up with.
+
+Molly came in with the grip packed. Some fudge was tucked in to help out
+his journey and Edwin, with the warm wishes of the kimono party,
+started on his patriotic travels.
+
+"Remember to let Prexy know I am almost dead with neuralgia and do not
+let a soul but Andy on to the fact that I am off on a journey. I'll
+creep in to-morrow night. Keep your eyes open for deviltries that the
+Misels may be up to, but don't let them know you are not the dummies
+they think you. They will not be classed as alien enemies until war is
+formally declared, and that will be day after to-morrow, according to
+the latest news."
+
+Nance was quietly stitching while most of the above conversation was
+going on, but her thoughts were very busy. The idea that was uppermost
+in her mind was that the day United States was to form an alliance with
+the nations, she was to form one equally strong with her Andy.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+WAR RELIEF
+
+
+Edwin Green occasionally had an attack of neuralgia that incapacitated
+him for work for at least a day, so when Molly solemnly gave out the
+news that her poor husband was suffering with one of his spells of
+that painful malady, sympathy was expressed by servants, teachers, and
+students. Blinds in the invalid's room were carefully closed and the
+door locked, with the key in Molly's pocket. Instructions were sternly
+given that nobody must disturb him. When he felt better he would ask for
+what he wanted. Little Mildred was very sad that she was not allowed to
+take him his "tup of toffee."
+
+"I weckon he's a-gonter die, sho," she confided to Cho-Cho-San. "Only my
+mother don't know it or she wouldn't be a-smilin' an' laughin' so
+hard."
+
+"I am going to work this morning at my war relief, even if we are to get
+married to-morrow," declared Molly at breakfast. "If I let anything
+short of death interfere I get into bad habits, and the work simply must
+be done. They are crying out for more and more dressings."
+
+"Let's all of us go help! We can turn out oodlums of work if we try,"
+cried Judy.
+
+"Not Nance!" insisted Molly. "I know she has a lot of little stitches to
+put in before to-morrow."
+
+"If you will excuse me, I will beg off," blushed Nance. "Andy is coming
+in this morning for a few moments, besides."
+
+"I tell you, you must stay at home to take care of poor dear Edwin,"
+laughed Judy. "It would look terribly heartless for all of us to go
+leave him."
+
+"Oh, I forgot Edwin!" declared Molly, just as Kizzie came in with a
+stack of waffles. The girl looked at her mistress in astonishment. What
+was coming over her Miss Molly, "fergittin' of the boss and then
+a-larfin' about it?"
+
+"Shall I take Andy up to see him?" asked Nance soberly.
+
+"Perhaps!"
+
+"Hadn't we better take the kids along so their noise won't disturb poor
+dear Brother Edwin?" suggested Judy, "Mildred and Cho-Cho and Poilu, the
+puppy." Poilu was a diminutive mongrel, the love of Mildred's heart.
+
+"Oh, Mother, please, please!" begged Mildred.
+
+"I'm so 'appee! I'm so 'appee!" sang Cho-Cho as Molly smiled her
+consent.
+
+"They can play in the churchyard and will be good, I am sure," she
+declared.
+
+And so Nance was left to put in her finishing stitches, to receive her
+lover and to take care of the fictitious case of neuralgia.
+
+"Hot cloths on his head if he is in very great agony," Molly called back
+as the gay throng started for the war relief rooms. "There is more
+aspirin in the top drawer if he is in much pain."
+
+Nance had a busy morning answering the 'phone, which rang many times
+with inquiries for the popular professor. Mary Neil sent a box of candy
+to Molly as a kind of consolation prize and Billie McKym sent Edwin a
+pot of flowers. Lilian Swift sent a basket of fruit.
+
+"If their friends rally around them so for an imaginary disease, what
+would they do if something were really the matter?" thought Nance.
+
+M. Misel and Andy met at the front door, Misel to inquire for the poor
+ill man and Andy to catch a glimpse of his Nance. Misel had walked
+slowly and painfully across the campus from his class room. Nance, from
+the window, had watched him approaching and she could but admire his
+patience as he made his crippled way.
+
+"It must be worse to have to pretend to be lame than to be lame," she
+said to herself. "I wonder if Andy is still fooled."
+
+The two men came into the library together, Andy showing great
+solicitude for the disabled foreigner. Misel was so extremely polite and
+seemed so distressed at Edwin's illness that Nance could hardly believe
+that Judy and the girls could be right in the discovery they had made
+the night before. His manner was perfect, so respectful, so kindly and
+courteous.
+
+"I believe I am to wish you joy, Dr. McLean,--and I do so with all my
+heart." Andy grinned his appreciation. "My wife and I were quite charmed
+by Miss Oldham. I hear you are to go to the front to assist poor
+stricken France. I admire the courage of your fiancee to contemplate
+going with you."
+
+"It would take more for me to stay away," whispered Nance softly.
+
+"Ah, it is the spirit of the women which is what the Germans have to
+fight!"
+
+"Is not the spirit of the German women quite as courageous as ours?"
+asked Nance, looking at Misel keenly.
+
+"Ah! _Wonderschoen!_" his eyes glowed. Suddenly the fact that he had
+dropped into German seemed to embarrass him. "That is--that is the
+word for the German women, just as 'wonderful' is the one for the
+Americans."
+
+"Tell me about Edwin," interrupted Andy, as though he meant to put Misel
+at his ease again. "Is he very ill?"
+
+"Oh, very!"
+
+"Can't I go up to see him?"
+
+"Molly said he was not to be disturbed. These headaches just wear
+themselves out. He will be all right to-night."
+
+"But there is something to be done before it wears Edwin out as well as
+itself," insisted the young doctor.
+
+"Molly says not!" Nance shook her head at Andy as much as to tell him he
+was talking too much, and that young man subsided until Misel had gone.
+Then Nance revealed to her lover the whole nefarious plot.
+
+"I had my doubts about that man from the first. I could not see how
+anyone as lame as he was could have jumped up so briskly. The beast! How
+could you be so polite to him?"
+
+"Camouflage! Fighting the devil with fire!"
+
+"I am glad old Ed took matters in hand so promptly. I tell you these
+college professors show up pretty well in these times! Wilson and Green
+forever!"
+
+In the meantime the industrious war relief workers were hard at it. The
+be-aproned and be-kerchiefed ladies of Wellington held their seances in
+the basement of the little church. It was astonishing how large was
+their output, but busy fingers had been steadily at work ever since word
+had come from France that wounded men were dying for lack of surgical
+dressings, and that word had come very soon after the breaking out of
+the World War.
+
+Women with earnest faces were bending over the long tables, some rolling
+bandages; some tearing cotton cloth; some pulling threads for careful
+cutting of gauze, later to be deftly folded in the prescribed shape. In
+one corner, cotton batting was being fluffed up for the making of
+fracture pillows. Huge baskets were being emptied by one group as they
+stuffed the pillows, while others were being filled by the fluffers,
+as Judy called the women whose duty it was to pick the cotton. Much
+sneezing went on in this corner and he who wonders why, might try once
+fluffing unrefined cotton.
+
+"Let me make the tampons!" begged Jessie.
+
+"I know why! Because they look like powder puffs," teased Edith.
+
+The house party was received with enthusiasm by the Wellington workers.
+There always seems to be more work than can be accomplished and then
+workers come and by hook or crook the task is completed. All of our
+girls had done some war relief work, so it was easy to set them to
+their stints. Pretty Jessie could make tampons that were so soft and so
+regular that they really did look like powder puffs. Katherine could
+pick cotton as fast as Mother Carey can chickens and her advent caused
+an increase of sneezing. Edith stuffed fracture pillows just to show
+that she could go faster than her sister. Margaret rolled bandages with
+a precision equal to her parliamentary ruling when she was presiding
+officer. Otoyo and Judy and Molly folded the gauze into the neat little
+six-inch squares. This is the most difficult part of the work, requiring
+such accuracy that only the expert should choose that table. The edges
+must come just together, no threads must be left on the gauze, the
+corners must be turned under exactly enough and the finished articles
+stacked in even piles.
+
+Madame Misel came in with the work she had taken home to finish. Never
+were such neat, wonderful dressings as hers. In the short time she had
+been at Wellington she had accomplished the work of two women, bringing
+in great stacks of the accurately-made dressings.
+
+It was difficult for the girls to treat her with the courtesy they
+knew it was policy to employ. Behind that calm mask they could now
+detect the lying spy. Her expression was as demure as ever and she
+spoke with the same hesitation that they felt was assumed, just as
+her husband's halting gait was. Why they should have taken up that
+particular disguise, Molly and her friends were at a loss to know.
+
+Madame Misel was almost a beautiful woman. Animation would have made her
+quite beautiful, animation and better dressing. Her hair was parted in
+the middle and brushed as slick as glass, coiled in a tight knob at
+exactly the wrong angle. She habitually wore an old-fashioned basque of
+a bygone cut buttoned up close to the neck with a narrow band of white
+collar, which but accentuated the severity of her garb. Her shoes were
+broad and ugly with no heels, her skirt skimpy and badly hung.
+
+Judy studied the countenance of the foreigner as she bent over her work.
+The nimble fingers moved very rapidly as she folded the gauze.
+
+"Gee, I'd like to sketch her!" Judy whispered to Molly. "A mixture of
+Mona Lisa and the Unknown Woman and plain repressed devil!"
+
+She whipped out her sketch book, which was never far from her, and with
+a few strokes had Madame Misel's pose, then with a skill that was quite
+wonderful had suggested her features. The model moved uneasily as though
+conscious of scrutiny, but before she looked up Judy had closed her book
+and was demurely folding gauze. Madame arose and walked away, standing
+by the table where Margaret was rolling bandages. Judy again whipped
+out her book and made a rapid impression of the unstylish figure in its
+flat shoes and tight basque.
+
+Just then little Mildred and Cho-Cho came screaming from the churchyard
+where they had been playing happily. Mildred had in her arms the poor
+little much-petted puppy. Blood was streaming from the creature's leg
+and he was giving forth pathetic wails.
+
+"A big dog done bitted him all up!" cried Mildred.
+
+"Greatly dog 'ave 'urt little puppee!" said Cho-Cho-San.
+
+"First aid to the injured!" exclaimed Judy, as she took the bleeding
+canine in her arms. The pile of beautifully made dressings Madame Misel
+had just brought in was on the corner of the long table. Without a
+by-your-leave, Judy snatched up one from the top and bound it around the
+poor gory leg. "There, you poor little precious! You may be part French
+poodle, anyhow, and surely a wound is a wound."
+
+Madame Misel put out a hand as though to stay her, but before she could
+say anything Judy had the dressing wrapped around the puppy's little
+leg.
+
+"Too bad to take one so perfectly made, but I just grabbed the one
+closest to hand. Now, Mildred, you and Cho-Cho can be Red Cross nurses
+and little Poilu can be your wounded warrior. Take him out and nurse him
+carefully. It isn't much of a place and no doubt with good care he will
+be all well by to-morrow."
+
+"I--think--it--would be--advisable to--apply--iodine to the
+wound--is it--not so, Madame Brown? I shall be pleased to--go
+to--my--house--and--procure some," faltered Madame Misel.
+
+"I don't think it is really necessary," insisted Molly. "We shall be
+going home presently and I can put some on then. You are very kind."
+Enemy alien or not, Madame Misel was certainly very thoughtful to want
+to take the trouble for the pet. Molly, ever ready to see the good in
+persons, had a feeling that this quiet, pleasant woman could not be
+shamming. Perhaps Misel was not what he should be, but not this wife,
+who was so untiring in her labors of mercy.
+
+When they started home, the roly-poly Poilu seemed to have recovered
+entirely. He did not even limp, so he was spared the ordeal of having
+the stinging iodine poured on the wounded leg. It was nothing more than
+a scratch anyhow, Judy declared.
+
+At midnight Edwin returned, letting himself quietly in the front door.
+Molly was waiting for him, eaten up with curiosity about what had
+transpired. He had been closeted with the Secret Service officials, who
+considered the matter of the gravest importance. Two of the cleverest
+and most cautious of the detective force were put on the job.
+
+"They were no doubt on the train with me," he said, "but I have no idea
+what they look like or what disguise they themselves will employ. At
+least a dozen persons got off the train at Wellington Station and all of
+them or none of them may have been Sherlock Holmeses."
+
+"I hope your neuralgia is better," laughed Molly.
+
+"Well, the joke of it is, I really did have neuralgia all day, not
+severe enough to keep me from enjoying a very good luncheon with your
+brother Kent and Jimmie Lufton at the Press Club, but quite bad enough
+to keep you from having told a lie."
+
+"Poor dear! I am so sorry for you to have suffered at all, but it is
+certainly considerate of you to be instrumental in saving my soul. And
+now, since to-morrow is the wedding day, we had better get all the sleep
+we can."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+TILL DEATH DOTH US PART
+
+
+The small home wedding that Nance and Molly had originally planned grew
+to be quite large. Little by little it seemed impossible to get married
+without first one person and then the other. Andy had many friends at
+Exmoor and Wellington; Dr. and Mrs. McLean knew half the country and had
+a long list to be invited; Nance wanted the whole faculty and some of
+the girls who were favorites of Molly's; Kent Brown arrived from New
+York bringing with him Mr. Matsuki, frankly delighted to be included in
+so honorable an assemblage.
+
+"Surely they can't all of them sleep here," said Edwin to his wife as he
+put on his wedding garments.
+
+"They can, but they won't," she answered, laughing at his woeful
+expression. "The house party breaks up after the ceremony. Do I look all
+right?"
+
+"Beautiful!"
+
+"I mean my dress!"
+
+"But I mean you! I don't know anything about your dress except that it
+is blue as it should be."
+
+"Can you find your collar buttons and is your tie all right?" asked the
+anxious housewife as she accepted with very good grace the embrace Edwin
+felt was necessary to his happiness just then.
+
+"Yes! Everything O. K.! I am sorry for the bride because you are so
+lovely, honey. Nance is a pretty girl but I am afraid nobody will see
+her because of the matron of honor."
+
+"Such a goose! Now I must go look after the flower girls. Katy has them
+coralled in the nursery where they can't get dirty. They are the
+sweetest looking creatures you ever saw in your life. Dodo looks like a
+beautiful cabbage rose himself, his cheeks are so rosy. I wish Mother
+could see him."
+
+"Why doesn't she come on to the wedding?"
+
+"Sue needs her in Kentucky. The only trouble about Mother is that there
+is only one of her. I need her more than anything right now. If she were
+here she would take hold of this wedding breakfast and I would know it
+would come off right," sighed Molly, who, true to her character, had
+planned to do enough for two persons. "Thank goodness, Judy is here!"
+
+The ceremony was to be at twelve and then a wedding breakfast served.
+This meant Molly was to be very busy. The girls were helping, but at the
+same time they were more or less flustered trying to get themselves
+dressed all in one room. They had determined to make this a gay light
+wedding as to clothes at least. There was a feeling of excitement in
+every breast, excitement mingled with sadness. Was not this the most
+momentous day in the life of every true American? War was declared!
+Perhaps had they realized just what war meant, those girls could not
+have donned those gay, bright garments. Would they have had the courage
+to wish their friend God-speed so cheerily? I believe they would. They
+were of the stuff of the mothers of men. On that second of April, 1917,
+every woman in the United States must have felt somewhat as Molly
+Brown's college friends felt. It was a feeling of excitement, awe,
+exhilaration and dread combined.
+
+Nance was gowned in white with a wonderful lace veil Otoyo had brought
+as her present. It was as filmy as the clouds that rest on Fujiyama, the
+sacred mountain of Otoyo's country.
+
+"Only suppose she had brought a tea basket like mine! What would that
+have looked like on your head?" giggled Judy, who was in a strangely
+hysterical state. She was one girl who very well knew what the war was
+to mean. Had she not been on the outskirts of war in 1914 when she was
+stranded in Paris? Had she not seen the soldiers marching off bidding
+farewell to their nearest and dearest,--sometimes a final farewell? Kent
+had spent all the time he could in training camps since they had been
+opened to citizens of the United States, and now he was confident of
+receiving a commission. Perhaps it would mean that her husband would be
+in the trenches in a short time. She wanted him to want to go, was proud
+of him for wanting to,--but oh, the agony of it all!
+
+Almost time for the ceremony now! Molly made her final tour of
+inspection. Edwin, Kent and Mr. Matsuki were safe in the den where they
+eagerly discussed politics. Dr. and Mrs. McLean arrived, holding Andy
+between them as though they might lose him before it was time.
+
+"I meant to help you, Molly, child, but my hea-r-r-t is so joompy I am
+afraid it will be best for me to compose meself," said the poor mother.
+"Don't let Andy know!"
+
+Molly kissed the dear lady and asked Katherine to stay near her.
+Katherine's dressing was always a simple matter, as her gowns consisted
+of shirt-waists and skirts in various materials to suit various
+occasions. She declared she could dress in the dark and look just as
+well as though she had had cheval glasses and a blaze of light.
+
+The other girls were ready and came down to the parlors to help receive
+the guests. Nance was lovely and looked as fresh and sweet as a white
+violet as she sat in her room sedately awaiting the hour. A visit to the
+nursery disclosed the children piously standing with backs to the window
+and arms held well away from their fluffy skirts, as charming flower
+girls as one could find.
+
+"I'm so 'appee! I'm so 'appee! I'm Mildred's Japanese dollee! She's my
+kick-up dollee!" sang the little Cho-Cho-San. "All I want is bald spot,
+and all she wants is stick up hair!"
+
+"Ain't we your little comforts, Muvver?" asked Mildred.
+
+"Indeed you are, my darling! Now when Judy calls, you come running so
+you can go down the stairs in front of Aunt Nance. Judy will have your
+wreaths all ready. Where is Katy?"
+
+"She's peeking at the comply."
+
+"Well, you kiddies be good and don't get your dresses mussed. It is
+almost time now. Don't wake Dodo." Of course Dodo had gone to sleep,
+since there was nothing more important on hand just then. Molly hurried
+off to the kitchen to see that the wedding breakfast was coming on as
+she had planned. Mrs. Murphy had hobbled up to help Kizzie, and Mrs.
+McLean had sent over her two maids.
+
+"All they need is a boss," sighed poor Molly. "If I only could be two
+places at one time!"
+
+But whose familiar figure was that seen through the scullery door? The
+maids were all in a broad grin and Kizzie, as she expressed it, "was
+fittin' to bust."
+
+"Mother! Mother! Where on earth did you come from?" and Molly had that
+dear lady clasped in her arms. "What are you doing in the back? Come on
+and hurry and get dressed! It is almost time!" Molly felt like little
+Cho-Cho when she cried out: "I'm so 'appee! I'm so 'appee!"
+
+"I just this minute arrived and have no idea of dressing!" cried that
+dear lady when she could speak.
+
+"Of course you needn't dress! You are lovely as you are--your hair is a
+bit mussed--and----"
+
+"You mussed it but it will do very well for the part I am to play. I
+have no idea of appearing. I mean to serve this breakfast."
+
+"But, Mother, I couldn't let you!"
+
+"Nonsense! That is what I hurried on for. Why, child, when I realized
+that you were having a house party and a wedding and going to serve a
+great breakfast, I simply jumped on the train with a hand-bag and flew
+to you. You always have behaved as though you were triplets. Now run
+along and don't tell a soul I am here. I can be honored later on; now I
+want a big apron and room to operate. Kizzie has already told me what
+the breakfast is to be and you need not think about it. Run along!"
+
+"Well, one more hug and I am gone. Aren't you even going to peek at the
+comply, as Mildred says?"
+
+"Oh, I'll see the ceremony, never fear; but fly, Molly! The guests are
+coming."
+
+Molly felt as though she really could fly. Her mother's arrival had
+relieved her of all fear about the wedding breakfast. It would be
+obliged to go off without a hitch now. Dear, dear Mother! How like her
+to come quietly slipping in the back way just in the nick of time!
+
+One could have heard a pin drop in the old square house on the campus as
+the first strains of the wedding march arose and the rustle of skirts on
+the stairway announced the approach of the wedding procession. Andy was
+shaking and shivering in the hall, tightly clutching his father's arm.
+He had declared that Dr. McLean must be his best man and would hear of
+no other. Of course he was just as scared as the groom always is, at
+least, all proper grooms.
+
+At Judy's signal the little flower girls came dancing from the nursery,
+their fluffy skirts flying. The wreaths and garlands were handed them
+and they marched down the stairs feeling much more important than Nance
+herself.
+
+"Heavens!" thought Molly as she followed them with Nance, "what on
+earth is the matter with Mildred's hair?" It was standing up in a most
+peculiar way. Instead of the curls that Katy had so carefully made, her
+ringlets had been brushed out and Molly realized that at least four
+inches of her daughter's hair had been cut off. "And Cho-Cho-San! What
+has happened to her?" In the middle of the child's head was a bare spot
+at least three inches in diameter. It looked as though it had been
+shaved.
+
+Whatever the matter was, it affected the flower girls not in the least.
+With many tosses of those shorn heads they marched into the parlor,
+scattering their posies as they had been told. When Otoyo saw the bald
+spot on the head of her offspring she almost fainted and had to hold on
+to the ready arm of honorable husband. Cho-Cho-San had clipped Mildred's
+hair to make it stand up like a kick-up dolly, and Mildred had stolen
+her father's safety razor and converted her little friend into a
+veritable Japanese dolly.
+
+Nothing but the solemnity of the occasion kept Molly from hysterics. The
+little wretches must have got busy after she made her visit to the
+nursery. Evidently they were doing what Mildred called "playing true."
+Cho-Cho was a Japanese dolly and Mildred was a kick-up. The little
+visitor did look exactly like one of those fascinating Japanese dolls,
+and Molly could but smile in spite of her distress. She was afraid to
+catch Judy's eye as she stepped back to let Andy take his place by
+Nance's side.
+
+Never had the wedding ceremony seemed so impressive as on that second of
+April. Every mind was filled with the importance of the step that the
+country was taking, and with the prayer that Andy and Nance would
+prosper, was breathed the thought that the United States might come out
+victorious.
+
+Nance was to go with Andy's unit in the capacity of interpreter. She was
+not a brilliant French scholar but was thorough in her knowledge of that
+as of everything she had undertaken. She frankly declared that she had
+been separated from Andy long enough and she intended to follow him to
+the ends of the earth if need be. It was that wonderful fact that made
+Andy's "I will!" so strong and clear. His tremblings left him and he
+stood by his dear girl like the soldier of the Red Cross that he was.
+Nothing was impossible or too hard if Nance was to be with him.
+
+Mrs. McLean's good, honest face was like an angel's as she gazed on
+her new daughter-in-law. No jealousy was depicted there--nothing but
+adoration, gratitude that the girl was to make her Andy happy. Poor Dr.
+McLean was sobbing like a baby and his good wife had to put her arms
+around him to comfort him.
+
+All over! "Whom God hath joined together let no man put asunder." Andy
+clasped his Nance with the look of: "I dare anyone to try!"
+
+Otoyo and Molly held a whispered consultation over their imaginative
+offspring and decided that nothing was to be said or done to the
+culprits on that day of days,--the reckoning must be deferred.
+
+Those infants were greatly astonished, somewhat relieved and secretly
+chagrined that their prank was not noticed. They had expected to be even
+more important than the bride in their roles of Japanese and kick-up
+dolls.
+
+"I weckon nobody don't love us 'nough to spank us even," pouted Mildred.
+
+"Japanese babee gets not spank-ed--but honorable mother frowns on
+Cho-Cho when she loves her most after naughtiness--but now--but now--she
+smiles, but not with love," was the wail of the companion in crime and
+misery.
+
+The efficient helmsman in the kitchen steered the wedding breakfast to
+safety. The affair went off with such expedition that the housekeepers
+present marveled at Molly's cleverness.
+
+"She must have trained her servants wonderfully well," whispered one.
+
+"I remember the joke they got off on Molly in college," laughed Miss
+Walker. "It was that she came of a family of famous cooks."
+
+"It is not only the cooking now," said Mrs. Fern, Edwin's cousin and the
+mother of the perfect Alice. "It is the way it is served and the
+orderliness of the waitresses. I wonder that Molly can be with her
+guests while it is being done unless she has had a caterer come up from
+New York. I simply have to be in the pantry myself when my daughters
+entertain on a large scale. That is, unless I can hire someone to come
+take charge, and Wellington does not boast such a person. Alice is very
+particular but not willing to do much herself,--not able, in fact," she
+added lamely, a little afraid of having criticized her perfect daughter
+in public.
+
+Mrs. Fern was very fond of Molly and admired her greatly in spite of
+the fact that she could not help bearing her a tiny secret grudge for
+marrying Edwin Green. That good lady had in her heart of hearts hoped
+that Alice was to bear off the professional prize. Perfect persons are
+not always very pleasant to live with and Alice Fern was no exception to
+the rule. Mrs. Fern wished no harm to Edwin but she would have been glad
+to shift her burden of perfectness to other shoulders.
+
+"We are just asking ourselves how you do it, my dear," she said as Molly
+came up to see that all was going well with her guests.
+
+"Do it! I'll tell you a secret that I was not to divulge but I am simply
+bursting with it: Mother is in the pantry! She came in the back way,
+without my even knowing she had left Kentucky, and now she is directing
+operations. She refuses to appear until the party is over."
+
+"Ah, that is the reason for that glow in your eyes!" exclaimed Miss
+Walker. "I used to say when you were a college girl that I could tell by
+your expression when the western mail had brought you a letter from
+Kentucky."
+
+"I didn't know it showed so," blushed Molly, "but it does make me feel
+warm all over when I know my mother is near."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+THE PUNISHMENT OF MILDRED
+
+
+The last rice thrown and the bridal party gone! Molly and Judy all that
+was left of the gay girls! The old crowd once more dispersed! I wonder
+if they will ever come together again. It had been a perfect time, and
+Molly, although dead tired, was very happy that she had been able to
+gather them in under her roof. All that worried her now was the fact
+that Mildred was to be punished. How, she was not certain.
+
+Mrs. Brown, no longer in her apron but now the most honored of all, was
+ensconced on the sofa with Dodo in her arms and Mildred snuggled up
+close to her side. The child's eyes were big and sad. Her little cropped
+head was drooping and her mouth trembling. Even Granny was not noticing
+her naughtiness. Evidently nobody loved her!
+
+Kent was seated on the floor, his head against his mother's knee, where,
+without exerting himself, he could see Judy's animated face and bright
+fluffy hair. Perhaps the time was soon coming when he would have to be
+far away from these beloved women. He was sure of his commission now and
+was ready for his country's call, but oh, it was hard to be uprooted
+from the pleasant spot where love had planted him! Ah, well! The war
+could not last forever and maybe there was a good time coming for all of
+them. It was hard to leave Judy, but it would be harder to take her with
+him if duty sent him to France. He did not criticize Andy McLean in the
+least. He knew his own business and Nance wanted to go with him but he,
+Kent Brown, had no idea of exposing his Judy to any more horrors of war.
+The taste both of them had had of it was enough.
+
+The little group around the fire was very quiet. Dormouse Dodo went
+off into his usual soporific state. Judy was knitting rapidly, and the
+click of her needles was all that broke the stillness. Judy always
+declared she did not mind knitting if she could just make her needles
+click. Molly was too tired to knit, too tired to do anything. If only
+she had settled matters with her first born! Her conscience told her it
+must be done and done soon. If only something would happen to keep her
+from having to do it, whatever it was to be. She actually prayed for
+strength to take the matter up and also that she would not have to take
+it up.
+
+Suddenly on the twilight calm of the library there arose a
+broken-hearted wail! Mildred had broken out into an abandon of grief.
+Her wails rent the air.
+
+"Gee whilikins! I thought the Germans had come," exclaimed Kent, jumping
+to his feet.
+
+"My darling, what is it?" asked Mrs. Brown as Mildred clutched her
+around the neck.
+
+"Oh, Granny, Granny! My muvver hates me!"
+
+"Oh, Molly! What have you done to this angel?" asked the grandmother
+almost sternly.
+
+"Nothing! I declare!"
+
+"That's jes' it! She ain't done nuffin! That shows she hates me. Kizzie
+done say, 'Who de Lord loveneth he chases,' an' I done did the wussest
+thing I could do an' my muvver she ain't so much as said: 'Why,
+Mildred!' I wants to git spanked! I wants to git spanked!"
+
+"Why, darling, what have you done?" asked Mrs. Brown, trying to control
+her risibles.
+
+"I done shave-pated, number-eighted my little Haythen friend. Kizzie
+called Cho-Cho:
+
+    "'Shave pate, number eight
+      Hit yo' haid aginst the gate.'
+
+"It sho did hurt Cho-Cho's feelings. And Cho-Cho, she slish-slashed my
+hair off so's I'd look cute. Nobody ain't told us we look cute--and
+nobody ain't spanked us nor nothin'--and nobody don't love us." This
+tirade came out between sobs.
+
+Kent and Judy roared with laughter but Molly and her mother tried to
+look sad and mournful.
+
+"Molly, I'm astonished! Why don't you spank your kid? I never heard of
+such an inhuman parent," teased Kent.
+
+Molly was very happy indeed. The miracle had come! Her prayer was
+answered. She did not have to punish Mildred. Mildred was punished.
+
+"You wouldn't have treated yo' dear little children so mean, would you,
+Granny?"
+
+"You bet she wouldn't have," insisted Kent. "Why, if I had shave-pated,
+number-eighted my little Haythen friends, your granny would have torn me
+limb from limb and beaten me black and blue."
+
+"Sho nuf?"
+
+"Yes, indeed, and if my little Haythen friend had chopped off all my
+pretty curls, I am sure her mother would have thrown her in the fire and
+poked holes in her with a red hot poker."
+
+"Jes' 'cause they loved you so much?"
+
+"Yes, just because they loved us so much."
+
+"Me'n' Cho-Cho wisht we could git throwed in the fire," sighed the
+repentant Mildred. "But, Uncle Kent," and she got up and put her little
+mouth close to his ear, "don't you think I made a mighty cunning little
+Japanese dolly out'n my Haythen friend?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+A DEATH
+
+
+"Aunt Judy, my Poilu is tellible sick! He can't open up his mouf mo'n
+'bout a minute far. Won't you please, ma'm, punch it open wif the button
+hook so's I kin poke some breafkast down him?"
+
+Mildred had the little puppy clasped in her arms and he did seem to be
+very miserable. His eyes were partly closed and his teeth were tightly
+clamped together.
+
+"I weckon that big ol' dog what eated a piece out'n him done made him so
+sick."
+
+"But, honey, that was a week ago, and if it had been going to make him
+sick it would surely have affected him long ago. It was nothing but a
+scratch, and don't you remember Aunt Judy bound it up so tight it only
+bled a moment?"
+
+Judy and Kent had remained at Wellington for a visit. Kent was so soon
+to join his regiment that he felt he could not tear himself away from
+his mother and sister, so they had lingered on after the other guests
+had departed. The bride and groom had also returned after a flying visit
+to Nance's old home and were now with the McLeans, Nance declaring that
+Andy's mother must have all she could of her son before he was to sail
+for France.
+
+Judy took the puppy in her lap and smoothed his silky sides. The little
+fellow opened his eyes and gave her a grateful glance. Mildred did
+squeeze a little too tight when a fellow felt as sick as poor little
+Poilu did.
+
+"Maybe we had better get the doctor for him," suggested Judy. "There
+come Andy and Aunt Nance now, across the campus! Call them, Mildred!
+Andy is not too proud to doctor a dog."
+
+Mildred delightedly ran to the door and waved her arms frantically. "Hi
+there, brideangroom! brideangroom! Somebody's mighty sick in this here
+house. Better hurry up or they might go deaded!"
+
+Andy and Nance quickened their pace and hastened into the house.
+
+"Who is it?" they cried anxiously.
+
+"It's my littlest brudder!"
+
+"Dodo! What is the matter with my little husband?" asked Nance
+anxiously.
+
+"'Tain't Dodo! He ain't my littlest brudder. I'se got anudder brudder.
+Ain't you knowed about him?"
+
+Nance and Andy were much mystified, but they followed the amusing little
+creature into the library. Nance thought perhaps the big-hearted Molly
+had adopted a French orphan,--Molly was quite capable of doing it.
+
+"There's my brudder!" and Mildred pointed to the suffering puppy. "Ain't
+it too bad he's got a tail?"
+
+Andy laughed as he lifted the poor little Poilu to his own knees.
+
+"What is the matter with him, Andy?" was Judy's anxious query.
+
+"It looks like the last stages of tetanus." The patient was even then in
+a violent convulsion. Andy mercifully laid his handkerchief over the
+little fellow's head, dreading that Mildred should see his suffering.
+
+"I'd put him out of his misery but he will be gone in a moment anyhow,"
+he said sadly. "Has he been hurt?"
+
+"A week ago he got bitten by a dog, but it was a mere scratch and did
+not amount to a row of pins, so Molly and I decided."
+
+"Did you put anything on the wound?"
+
+"Nothing but a surgical dressing down at the war relief rooms. I
+remember it was one of the beautifully made dressings Madame Misel had
+just brought in----"
+
+Andy sprang up, a wild light in his eye. The puppy had breathed its last
+so he handed it over to Judy without more ado.
+
+"Where is Molly?"
+
+"She has gone down in the village to pack supplies at the war relief
+rooms. There were lots of things to get off, so she went quite early. I
+am to follow a little later, just as soon as Kent finishes primping.
+What is the matter?"
+
+"There may be much the matter. You and Kent come as fast as you can,"
+and Andy and Nance hurried off without any more explanation.
+
+The news was broken to Mildred that her pet was no more and her bruised
+heart was much comforted with promises of a funeral later on when Kizzie
+got time to make arrangements. Kent and Judy caught up with Andy and
+Nance before they reached the old church where the war work was carried
+on.
+
+"What under Heaven is the matter?" panted Judy.
+
+"It may be nothing, but I must investigate. Let's go in as quietly as
+possible. Does Madame Misel still work on the surgical dressings?"
+
+"Yes, indeed! And such beautiful work as she does! Molly insists that
+she must have a great deal of good in her to give so much time to this
+work. Sometimes I think I must have dreamed that they spoke as they did
+that night in the garden. Why should pro-Germans and spies choose this
+particular spot, anyhow?"
+
+The workroom was filled with very busy ladies when our young couples
+entered. Molly was tying up dressings, after carefully inspecting and
+counting them. An order had come for many bandages and other dressings
+and all hands were at work trying to get them off. Madame Misel was
+deftly arranging the rolled bandages in pyramids and then tying them
+with strings made of the selvedge torn from the cotton. Nothing goes to
+waste in this war work. Madame's countenance was as calm as ever as she
+bent over her work, but when she saw the two men enter, Judy noticed a
+sudden alertness in her glance and a tiny spot of red on her usually
+white cheek. As she pulled the selvedge string, she must have given it
+an unusual tug for it broke and the tightly-rolled bandages flew hither
+and yon over the floor.
+
+"Humph! There is no telling how many germs got picked up in that
+scatteration," muttered Andy as he stooped and gathered the bandages.
+
+"The--bandage--does--not--touch the--wound," said Madame, evidently
+forgetting she was speaking to a surgeon.
+
+"No?" said Andy shortly.
+
+"Molly," he said, "I must speak with you a moment."
+
+"Well, Andy dear, I am awfully busy. You come home to luncheon with me,
+you and Nance, and then you can speak all you've a mind to."
+
+"I must speak now," whispered Andy sternly.
+
+"Heavens! Is anything the matter?" asked Molly.
+
+"I am not sure," and Andy drew her towards the vestry at the back of the
+church. "Tell me, Molly, have you packed all the dressings that that
+Misel woman has made?"
+
+"Why, no, not all of them! Why?"
+
+"Have you mixed them with the others?"
+
+"No! They are so beautifully folded that I do not have to inspect them,
+and so I have put them in boxes to themselves. She is the best worker I
+ever saw."
+
+"Molly, I shall have to ask you not to get this shipment off to-day."
+
+"But, Andy, it is most important! The poor wounded are bleeding to death
+and the ship sails in two days. We must get them off this evening if
+they are to catch that boat. What is your reason?"
+
+And then Andy told her of the puppy's death. He said the fact that his
+first aid had come from those very rooms, and that tetanus, or lock-jaw,
+had set in on a perfectly healthy puppy when he had a mere scratch from
+another dog, made him suspicious that tetanus germs were on some of the
+bandages.
+
+"Why, Andy, that is ridiculous! Poor Madame Misel may be in sympathy
+with Germany in spite of all she says, she and her husband, but she
+could not do such a vile thing as that." Molly could not help feeling
+impatient and indignant with her old friend. "Only look at her sweet
+face and all thought of such infamy will leave your mind."
+
+Andy did glance towards Madame Misel and the look of venomous hatred
+that he surprised on her face was shocking. The young physician laughed
+grimly. "Molly, you are no judge of persons unless they happen to be
+angels. You think wings are getting ready to sprout even from our
+enemies."
+
+"Perhaps they are! Who knows?"
+
+"You may be right, but in the meantime, please don't let any of these
+dressings get off. I must see those Secret Service men. Where are they?"
+
+"Edwin knows, I believe, but he has not told me."
+
+Molly was irritated beyond endurance. How was she to let these women
+know that the shipment must be held up? It was all of it so absurd. The
+women had done the work and now these men must come poking their fingers
+into the pie that they had had none of the work of making. The idea of
+accusing Madame Misel of such a crime! Judy, too, seemed to be doubting
+the stranger, and Nance, of course, would be aiding and abetting Andy.
+
+"I shall have to ask you to be very quiet, not to give this creature an
+inkling of our suspicions," commanded Andy sternly. "That is very
+important."
+
+"Well, naturally, I'll hardly be so rude as to let her think anyone is
+so unkind as to doubt her," and Molly's lip trembled.
+
+"Molly, dear Molly, don't hate me so. I can't help seeing that something
+is wrong and if I have the slightest suspicion, I must surely probe to
+the bottom. You must see that."
+
+"Of course I do, Andy, but I just can't bear to have anybody abused,
+especially a woman who makes such lovely dressings," and Molly tried to
+smile at her friend.
+
+"Well, I'll depend upon you to stop the work of getting them off and
+still not let the woman know she is under suspicion. Just go on packing
+but do not make the shipment."
+
+"I hate to resort to such subterfuge, but I'll do my best," sighed
+Molly.
+
+"Wouldn't it be better to bring one criminal to justice than to kill
+thousands of poor wounded men by dressing their wounds with tetanus
+germs?"
+
+"Of course, only--but--you see----"
+
+"Yes, I see that your heart is so tender and you are so honest yourself
+you think all the world must be like you."
+
+Molly went sadly back to her packing, all the joy and zest gone out of
+her work. How could nice men like Andy and Kent think such things about
+a poor defenseless woman? No doubt she did have a sneaking sympathy for
+Germany. Was not that natural? Had she and her countrymen not been under
+German rule long enough to consider the kaiser as their rightful ruler?
+Because her husband chose to pretend to be lame was no reason why
+everybody should think Madame Misel capable of such a dastardly thing as
+putting tetanus germs on the bandages of poor wounded soldiers. That was
+something no woman, no matter how bad, could do,--and surely this woman
+was not bad, not really bad. Molly Brown was so constituted that one had
+to be proven to be bad before she could believe evil of him or her, and
+then, as a rule, she would find some excuse for the sinner if not for
+the sin.
+
+Nance and Judy stayed on to help in the work, while Andy and Kent went
+to find the Secret Service agents. While the task of making bandages,
+etc., went rapidly forward, the detectives quietly ransacked the cottage
+occupied by the Misels. This was the first opportunity they had had of
+going over the house. The occupants had never before left it alone. Much
+of dire importance was discovered. Among other things a small laboratory
+where no doubt all kinds of evil germs were incubated. The search was
+made very rapidly, as they were anxious to leave things in such order
+that the owners would not suspect that they were under surveillance.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+GERMS
+
+
+As the two quietly-dressed, intelligent looking men were in the act of
+going through a desk, they saw from the window the slow and painful
+approach of M. Misel. Without a word they let themselves out of a back
+window, left open for emergencies, and before the master had opened the
+front door the detectives were over the back fence and out of sight.
+They were desirous of catching more than the Misels in their net and did
+not want to act too quickly.
+
+Had they peeped through the window, they would have seen Misel with an
+impatient gesture sling his crutch in one direction, his cane in
+another.
+
+"Lena!" he called, in anything but a gentle tone. "Lena!" And then with
+muttered curses, when he found his wife to be absent, he settled himself
+to look over the bunch of mail he had just obtained at the post-office.
+One letter he examined very critically before opening. It was an
+inoffensive enough looking envelope, addressed on a typewriter and with
+a postmark from New York. It had the appearance of a circular or
+advertisement of some sort, being made of cheap, greyish-white paper,
+the kind of letter one would wait until last to open in a pile of mail,
+being sure it was of no especial interest or importance. Misel seemed to
+find it very interesting, however. It was the one he chose from all the
+letters and papers, and as he examined it, he scowled darkly.
+
+"Lena!" he called as Madame Misel hurriedly entered the cottage, "Lena,
+some fool has been meddling with my mail!"
+
+"Perhaps not such a big fool as you are!" she answered tartly.
+
+"Look! The envelope has been opened before. Of course it is the letter
+from Fritz von Lestes, the one we have been awaiting." He tore it open
+and read aloud: "'The paint which you have ordered will be delivered
+immediately. Am sorry there should have been any delay. I am sending a
+light grey, as agreed upon.' Umm--I don't see how they could make much
+out of that."
+
+"Let me see the letter.--Of course they can make much out of it as there
+is no address,--you men bungle things so! Why should a man who is in the
+paint business write a letter with no address and sign his name so
+illegibly that no one could make it out? He should have had a letter
+head and a business envelope."
+
+"And speaking of bungling,--why did you go and leave the house with no
+one in it? Can't you see that is imprudent?"
+
+"Mrs. Green came for me and I had no excuse.--Besides, I am sure if I am
+by when the dressings are handed in that no one will inspect my work. I
+have been packing all morning and have seen to it that my labor has not
+been in vain."
+
+"Oh, peerless woman!" he said sarcastically.
+
+Madame Misel said nothing but busied herself over the luncheon. Suddenly
+she gave a little cry, half distress, half indignation. Misel hastened
+to her.
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"Look! This back window is not quite closed! Did you open it?"
+
+"No! I have not been here in the kitchen."
+
+"Then someone has been in the house," she announced in a dead tone.
+
+"Are you sure?"
+
+"Of course! I left the windows locked, stupid! Look about and see if all
+is in order."
+
+The detectives had worked as neatly as detectives can work, but the
+Misels found several traces of them. In one room a chair had been moved;
+in another a drawer had not been shut as close as Madame was confident
+she had left it; papers had been turned over in the desk, Misel was
+sure, although none were missing.
+
+"Someone has been in the laboratory, too! Look at this crucible! I
+always place them so,--and this has been turned."
+
+The pair faced each other with despair on their countenances.
+
+"What now?" they gasped.
+
+"We must make a flitting this very night!" exclaimed the woman. "Thank
+goodness, nobody dreams that you are not crippled nor that I am anything
+but the homely hausfrau I appear. The dressings will be off this very
+afternoon, too, so my work is completed in that line, at least. If you
+could boast as much, no doubt you would not mind leaving. I told you to
+begin the teaching at Exmoor sooner."
+
+"The youths were not ripe for it. I have begun in a way, but not much
+has been accomplished. Perhaps the person who has been here is just some
+prying neighbor and we are not really being watched. Go out and see if
+you can discover anything!"
+
+When Madame Misel peeped through the windows of the old church she saw
+enough to make her turn pale. Andy McLean was there with two strange men
+and Professor and Mrs. Green. Molly was weeping bitter tears as she
+untied the carefully packed surgical dressings. Madame saw at a glance
+that it was her work that was being examined by the men. She did not
+stop to make sure what they found on her beautifully made dressings, but
+turned and fled towards the cottage that she called home.
+
+"Why is she weeping?" she asked herself, and there was woman enough in
+her to know that Molly wept because one of her own sex had proved
+faithless.
+
+Blinds were pulled down in the cottage with the lovely old garden, and
+the activities that ensued could only be equaled by a circus breaking up
+to leave town. Madame Misel moved with a quiet precision that showed she
+was an adept at making a quick get-away. Misel worked with a fury of
+impatience. He went through his desk, scattering papers hither and yon
+and burning everything of no value. Other documents he stowed carefully
+away in his breast pocket. The laboratory was dismantled and small,
+mysterious-looking vials packed in boxes and placed in the huge
+suit-case that seemed to hold most of their belongings.
+
+A letter was written to the landlord informing him that his tenants had
+been called out of Wellington by the illness of a fictitious sister. A
+month's rent was enclosed. Another letter was written to the postmaster
+asking that mail be forwarded to an entirely imaginary address. The work
+proceeded rapidly. The cottage was always in apple-pie order, as Madame
+Misel was certainly an excellent housekeeper.
+
+"You must write to the president of the college," commanded Madame.
+
+"Naturally! Must I use the same sister?"
+
+"Of course! Why two lies when one will suffice?"
+
+A letter to Miss Walker was dispatched forthwith.
+
+"And now for our disguises,--or rather the time has come to discard our
+disguises!" cried Madame almost joyfully. "I hate to appear as such a
+frump!"
+
+Misel's disguise was composed principally of cane and crutch, but at his
+wife's instigation he shaved his mustache. With the help of a checked
+suit and red necktie and a brown derby hat a trifle too small for
+him, the pathetic and interesting teacher of the French language was
+transformed into the type of man one sees hanging around a race track.
+With a clever brush Madame put a quirk in his eyebrows that completed
+the portrait. Then a bit of court plaster was stuck on one of the
+perfect teeth which gave the handsome Misel a sinister look and
+suggested to the beholder former battles and fisticuffs in which he
+had been struck in the mouth.
+
+"Even your dying sister will not recognize you!" exclaimed his wife.
+
+Madame's transformation was even more startling than her husband's.
+First she shook out her smoothly brushed hair and with the help of
+curling tongs soon had a wave that the finest hair dresser in New York
+could not have exceeded. She piled her abundant hair up in curls and
+twists and coils, pulling out puffs over her ears. Then with pencil and
+rouge pot and powder puff she went to work on her countenance. A raging
+beauty was the outcome, but rather fast and loud looking. A lavender
+suit lined and slashed with corn-colored silk was then donned, with
+many rings and bracelets. The flat-heeled shoes were packed away in the
+suit-case with the sober costume, and high-heeled French boots were
+fitted on in their stead. A plentiful sprinkling of musk was added so
+that the nostrils were assailed as soon as the eyes.
+
+"Tough sports!" would have been the verdict of anyone meeting the
+Misels. They had decided on the night train to New York. The cottage was
+carefully locked, the key enclosed in the letter to the landlord, which
+they posted on their way to the station. Everything was going smoothly.
+The station was empty when the pair stepped upon the platform and in a
+moment the New York train came steaming around the curve.
+
+"Thank God, we are getting away unnoticed!" gasped Misel.
+
+"Thank God if you choose, but it would be more to the point if you
+thanked me. I can't see that anyone has helped you but me."
+
+"Oh, well! Have it your own way!" said the spurious bookmaker as they
+boarded the train.
+
+"Someone got left," he laughed as they took their seats in the chair
+car. "I saw a man and woman running down the road just as we got aboard.
+I am glad they got left. Whoever it is might have recognized us."
+
+"Nonsense! Didn't I tell you your own dying sister would not know you?"
+and Madame Misel smoothed her lavender draperies and jangled her many
+bracelets and rings, peeping in the mirror meantime to adjust her large
+beplumed hat. There was a commotion in the end of the Pullman and she
+heard a familiar voice. In the mirror she espied a familiar face, and
+under the heavily laid on rouge, the woman paled and the hand that
+adjusted her hat shook. Misel buried his face in the evening paper some
+traveler had left in his seat, while the innocent cause of their
+perturbation found a seat with the help of the porter.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+HER FATHER'S OWN DAUGHTER
+
+
+"I don't see why you take it so hard, Molly darling," said Judy as Molly
+told her of the detectives' findings and of the perfidy they had
+unearthed.
+
+"Why, I fancy I am grieving that such wickedness can be in this world,"
+sighed Molly. "I liked Madame Misel so much."
+
+"Well, I never did like her," declared Judy.
+
+Molly smiled, well remembering Judy's enthusiasm on arriving at
+Wellington and telling of the interesting couple she had met on the
+train.
+
+"I know what you are thinking about--of course I said they were
+interesting, but I never did like the woman much--she was too catty for
+me."
+
+This conversation was interrupted by the loud ringing of the telephone
+bell, which proved to be a long distance call for Judy from Mr. Kean in
+New York. His marching orders had come and he was to sail for France in
+a few days, and for the first time on record he could not take his
+little wife with him. Building roads and bridges in war time was very
+different from times of peace, and France at that time was no place for
+delicate little ladies.
+
+"You had better come right up to New York on the next train," was his
+ringing command. "Your mother needs you and I must see you, too."
+
+"All right, Bobby! Meet me at the Pennsylvania Station. I'll take the
+12.45--I am not going to let Kent come. He must be with his mother one
+more day,--his mother and Molly. So long! Be sure and meet me!"
+
+Then such a scrambling ensued! Kent must be persuaded he was neither
+wanted nor needed, a few things hurled into a bag, her sketch book
+tucked in her jacket pocket, and Judy was off like a whirlwind. She and
+Kent ran all the way to the station only to see the train pulling out
+as they stepped upon the platform.
+
+"I can get it! Keep the old bag!" cried that young woman as she sprinted
+down the track, her young husband running lightly by her side, laughing
+in spite of himself. If you have never run after a train and caught it
+you cannot realize the triumphant feeling Judy had as she grasped the
+rail and swung herself up on the rear coach. Fortunately it was not a
+vestibule train or she would have been shut out. Kent slung the bag up
+after her and then stood in the middle of the track until his Judy was
+lost in the darkness.
+
+"What a girl she is!" he laughed to himself. "What a dear girl!"
+
+The dear girl was rescued by a rather indignant brakeman and led through
+the empty coach that happened to be hitched on to the train and finally
+installed in the chair car, after many explanations and excuses had been
+made to train conductor and then Pullman conductor.
+
+Young women have no business on night trains with no tickets--certainly
+no business in boarding those trains from the rear, thereby risking
+their own necks and making the railroads liable to damage suits.
+
+"But you see my father telephoned me from New York," she confided to the
+train conductor, a grizzled looking old fellow with a decidedly military
+bearing. "He is going to France next week and he simply had to see
+me.--Perhaps you know my father," she added with a certain assurance
+that everybody connected with railroads ought to know Bobby.
+
+"More than likely!" was the grim reply. The conductor had no idea of
+being cajoled into good humor by this daring girl.
+
+"He is Mr. Robert Kean,--Bobby!"
+
+The conductor was suddenly a changed creature.
+
+"Know him! I should say I did! Bless my soul, if you don't look like
+him--same eyes--same mouth! Ha, ha! See Bob Kean missing a train! Not
+much!" and the erstwhile stern captain of the train now grasped Judy's
+hand. "Come on, I'll see that you get a chair, Miss Kean. I'm certainly
+pleased to make your acquaintance."
+
+"I'm not Miss Kean any more,--I'm Mrs. Kent Brown now.--It was my
+husband who pitched me and my luggage on the back end of the train."
+
+"Married! By jiminy! I can't believe Bob Kean has a married daughter!
+And your husband aided and abetted you in jumping on the back of fast
+trains, did he?" and the once grim captain laughed aloud. "Well, I'm
+glad you got a game husband. I don't know what your father would have
+done with a 'fraid cat."
+
+Judy's entrance in the Pullman caused some commotion. The old conductor
+was laughing heartily and the brakeman was in a much pleasanter frame of
+mind as he handed over Judy's bag to the grinning porter. There were
+about eight persons in the chair car as Judy entered and Judy-like, she
+immediately became intensely interested in them.
+
+Of course, the spot of color made by a flashy dame in lavender attracted
+her attention first, and then her companion in loud checks cried out to
+be noticed. What a couple! Race track written all over both of them!
+Even from three seats off Judy could smell the musk on the woman. The
+man's face was hidden by the newspaper and the woman seemed to be
+engaged in rapt contemplation of her beauty in the narrow little mirror
+by her chair. To Judy's disappointment the gaudy dame whirled her chair
+around so she could not see her face.
+
+"I bet she's a peacherino!" she said to herself.
+
+There were other persons in the train that proved interesting, too:
+among them a mother and child who appealed to Judy's artistic sense; a
+G. A. R. veteran who was sure he had been in worse battles than the
+Marne; an ancient lady from Louisiana who made our young artist wild to
+paint her white hair and patrician nose. Opposite Judy's chair was a
+young man, (or was he a young man?) At least he was not an old man!
+There were a few tiny lines around his twinkling bright blue eyes, but
+his movements were as alert as a college athlete's, and his mouth,
+though very firm, had the saucy expression of a street boy. Judy was
+sure she had seen his face before. The way his hair grew on his forehead
+in a so-called widow's peak reminded her vaguely of someone,--the cleft
+chin she was sure she had known somewhere. He was interested in her,
+too, she could plainly see. He had a pleasant, dependable expression,
+the kind of look one felt meant that in time of trouble he would be a
+good person to call on. He was making himself generally useful to the
+madonna-like mother and child; he had assisted the ancient lady from
+Louisiana to get up and sit down several times since Judy had so
+unceremoniously boarded the car.
+
+"I wish I knew where I had known him. His face is as familiar to me as
+my own."
+
+She felt in her jacket pocket for her sketch book. She must get an
+impression of the mother and child, and the old lady was destined to be
+sketched in, too. She longed to do the youngish-oldish person opposite,
+but he was too close for her to permit herself such a familiarity. She
+turned over the leaves of her book and suddenly came upon the page
+given up to the Tucker twins and their friend Page Allison. What
+delightful girls they were! Suddenly she could place the resemblance
+seen in the gentleman across the aisle. Of course his forehead and
+widow's peak were the same that Dum Tucker owned, and his cleft chin was
+the identical one belonging to Dee Tucker. Could he be their father?
+
+She remembered what the girls had told her of their delightful father.
+He was a newspaper man in Richmond, Virginia, and according to the twins
+was just about the most wonderful person in the world. Page Allison,
+too, had given him praise, although not quite so wildly unstinted as his
+daughters.
+
+"I think I'll drop something and let him pick it up for me and get in a
+conversation with him," Judy laughed to herself. "He is such a squire of
+dames, he is sure to pick it up."
+
+She turned the pages of her sketch book until she came to the quick
+impressions she had made of Madame Misel at the war relief rooms.
+
+"The wretch!" was her inward comment, and her thoughts went back to the
+last days at Wellington. She looked up; her eye was again chained by the
+gaudy lavender spot and she suddenly became conscious that she could see
+the woman's face in the large mirror at the end of the Pullman. Her eyes
+were down as she perused the pages of a magazine.
+
+Another familiar face! Where under Heaven had she seen just that chin
+and nose? Her eyes fell again on the open sketch book. Why, it is Madame
+Misel--no other! With quick strokes she copied the sketch and then
+cleverly added the beplumed hat, fluffy collar and fashionably cut coat.
+The woman stood up for a moment to get something from the pocket of her
+great coat, hanging on the hook at one side, and then Judy took in her
+general contours standing, and added some draperies to the full length
+figure she had also obtained of Madame Misel in the work room. High
+heels were put on the flat, unstylish shoes. The straight severe dress
+and basque were transformed into the fashionable, if gaudy, creation.
+Judy was careful not to erase any of the original lines and all of the
+new parts she sketched in in dots and dashes.
+
+The gentleman opposite was plainly interested in what she was doing and
+it evidently required all his self-control to keep from asking to be
+allowed to see.
+
+"They are the Misels and they are running away!" flashed into Judy's
+mind. "It is up to me to stop them--but how? The gent in checks is
+undoubtedly Misel. They can't fool me; I remember his ears too well and
+the way his hands held things."
+
+She glanced across the aisle and her eyes met the bright blue ones
+belonging to the widow's peak and cleft chin.
+
+"What would Bobby do in this case?" she asked herself.
+
+"Use the sense God gave him and get help if he couldn't cope with a
+thing single-handed," she answered herself.
+
+She accordingly let her sketch book slide from her lap, rubber and
+pencil hopping gaily after it.
+
+"Oh, thank you so much!" she exclaimed as the squire of dames
+immediately dived for the belongings and restored them to her. "I would
+not loose my sketch book for worlds."
+
+"I should say not! I have a daughter who is very much interested in
+art,--in fact, she is studying in New York now,--her specialty is
+sculpture, though."
+
+"Yes, I know her! She is Dum Tucker!"
+
+"You know my Dum! How wonderful! And how did you know she was--I was her
+father?"
+
+"By your widow's peak! I also know you are Dee's father by your chin."
+
+Mr. Tucker changed his seat, taking the one by Judy.
+
+"By Jove! You artists are a clever lot. You would make a great
+detective, Mrs. Brown. You must excuse me for knowing your name, but I
+heard you tell the captain what it was,--Mrs. Kent Brown. My girls have
+written me how kind you have been to them and I have been dying to make
+myself known to you, but was waiting for some kind of opening wedge."
+
+"And I, too, Mr. Tucker, have been wondering where I had seen you, when
+I found your girls' pictures in my little book. See! Here they are!"
+
+"And little Page, too!" He exclaimed eagerly scanning the sketches. "You
+are wonderfully clever at a likeness."
+
+"Do you think so? I--Mr. Tucker--I deliberately scraped up an
+acquaintance with you because I want you to do something for me," and
+Judy looked frankly into the honest eyes of her new acquaintance.
+
+"Why, Mrs. Brown, you know I am at your service."
+
+"I was sure of you somehow, even if I had not been almost certain you
+were related in some way to Dum and Dee Tucker. My little sketch book
+told me that and it told me something else, too, but I must begin at the
+beginning."
+
+Judy, whispering, began with her meeting of the Misels, of her
+interesting the Greens at Wellington, of Misel's substituting in French
+at the college and of Madame's work in the war relief. Jeffrey Tucker's
+eyes flashed as the newspaper man in him scented a rousing good story.
+When Judy got to the part where she and her friends went out in the
+night to hunt for adventure and found it in the manly shape of Misel
+taking strenuous exercise for a cripple, he beamed with joy and felt in
+his pocket for a pencil. Judy rapidly told him of the puppy's wounded
+leg and of the tetanus germs as well as ground glass being found in the
+dressings. He set his square jaw and looked as though he could eat the
+kaiser and all his crew at one mouthful.
+
+"And now I have come to the _denouement_!" gasped Judy, excitement
+making her breathless. "If I could recognize you by your likeness to my
+sketches, I fancy I could also recognize Madame Misel by sketches of
+herself. I got two of her this morning at the war relief. The detectives
+did not arrest them, as they want to get others in their dragnet, but in
+some way the spies must have caught on to the fact that they were under
+suspicion, as they sneaked away."
+
+"Are you sure?"
+
+"Sure as shooting! In fact they are on this train."
+
+"No!" excitedly.
+
+"Now, Mr. Tucker, you must compose yourself if we mean to catch the
+creatures!"
+
+"Certainly!" and the eager man sank back in his seat and tried to look
+as though he were having a mild conversation with the attractive young
+woman who had jumped on the back of the moving train.
+
+"Now that is better! Keep that nonchalant expression for what I am going
+to tell you----"
+
+"All right, fire away!"
+
+"They are on this coach, just three seats down.--Good boy, not to jump
+out of your skin! Now I am going to show you my sketch of the woman
+before and after. See, there is no doubt about her! You walk to the
+smoker and on the way back get a good look at her face and I bet you
+will be convinced."
+
+Jeffrey Tucker did as he was bid, giving Madame Misel such a casual look
+that he aroused no suspicion in her mind.
+
+"Gee! This is great! I'd rather bag some of these spies than do big
+hunting in the African Jungle. Now, most wise of all female detectives,
+what do you advise? We must act quickly."
+
+"I think you should take the conductors, both train and Pullman, into
+your confidence, and then send telegrams to New York to have the spies
+met with the proper reception. You can telegraph Bobby, I mean my
+father, if you think it best, and he can get in cahoots with the Secret
+Service people in New York. Bobby is the kind of man who doesn't let
+things go wrong. When he bores a hole in the mountain it comes out on
+the opposite side just exactly where he meant it to,--when he swings a
+bridge across a river it stays swung,--there is no giving way of
+supports and undermining from washings,--Bobby knows. If you telegraph
+him, he'll have detectives there all right and they will have the
+necessary warrants and handcuffs, too."
+
+"Well then, Bobby it is!" and Jeffrey Tucker quickly took Mr. Kean's
+address. Next the conductors were interviewed, and those good Americans
+quickly complied with any and every request. A long and explicit
+telegram was written to the gentleman who did not let mistakes happen,
+another one sent to the chief of police, in case Mr. Kean should not be
+at home to receive the telegram, (Jeffrey Tucker being the kind of man
+who did not let mistakes occur, either,) and then there was nothing to
+do but sit quietly in the Pullman and wait for the train to steam into
+New York.
+
+It seemed to Judy to be hours and hours, although the time certainly
+passed pleasantly with the friends she made on the train. She and Mr.
+Tucker talked to everybody except the two sporty looking individuals,
+and they would have had the audacity to talk with them if they had been
+given the slightest encouragement. But the Misels kept their backs
+studiously turned to their fellow travelers and did not court
+sociability.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+THE ARREST
+
+
+"Suppose they get off at Manhattan Junction and go to the Hudson
+Terminal instead of the big Pennsylvania Station!" panted Judy, her eyes
+shining with excitement and her fluffy hair standing on end as though an
+electric shock had gone through her system.
+
+"Who is giving the game away now?" teased her new friend. "I thought of
+that and warned the chief when I telegraphed him. If they do get off
+there, I'll get off, too, and you can go on to the other station where
+your father will meet you."
+
+"Not much I will! I'm going to keep my eye on that lavender spot until I
+see those wrists with something on them besides gold bracelets. You see,
+I feel responsible for this pair, having been the one to introduce them
+to Wellington society. If they get off at Manhattan Junction, so do I.
+Bobby will understand! He would have no use for me if I didn't see it
+through."
+
+"I believe you are a real patriot, Mrs. Brown."
+
+"Of course I am! But one thing sure I am not going to give my husband to
+the cause, and my father, and then let these mean spies go Scot-free.
+Now my dear friend and sister-in-law Molly,--Mrs. Edwin Green,--is so
+good that she can't believe anyone can be bad. She is just as patriotic
+as I am but she can't believe in the perfidy of Germany and the Germans.
+I truly believe she would not have the heart to nab these wretches even
+if she could not deny their guilt. Molly is an angel herself and I fancy
+maybe her angelic qualities do rub off some even on the worst
+characters. She may have helped this Madame Misel some, who knows? But I
+am going to help her even more by letting her get a taste of real
+punishment."
+
+"And I am going to do my best to help you help her," laughed Mr. Tucker.
+"We are nearing Manhattan Junction now and I do not see our friends
+making ready to get off."
+
+The pair sat quietly while the train stopped for a moment for passengers
+to change for the downtown station. Judy and Mr. Tucker were on the
+alert to leave the train if they saw the slightest movement on the part
+of the Misels, but the latter sat in evident certainty of their disguise
+not having been penetrated.
+
+"Now the curtain is to go up in a moment!" cried Judy. "I have never
+been in such a stew of expectation!"
+
+The train had entered its under-water tunnel and in what seemed hardly
+a minute they found themselves in the Pennsylvania Station. Jeffrey
+Tucker, true to his nature, must assist the old lady from Louisiana and
+the mother and child, but this time he assisted them by calling the
+porter and, with a generous tip, put them in his hands. He had other and
+more urgent fish to fry.
+
+"There's Bobby!" cried Judy. "They have let him through the gates!"
+
+So they had, and others, also. Mr. Robert Kean was eagerly scanning the
+windows of the coaches as they slowly passed in review. By his side were
+several alert looking men in plain clothes and near them were some
+brass-buttoned policemen.
+
+"You go out first," whispered Mr. Tucker to the impatient Judy, who
+looked like a hunting dog straining at the leash. "I'll bring up the
+rear in case of a bolt."
+
+The Misels got up quickly and without any delay moved towards the door.
+They seemed perfectly unconcerned, the woman patting her curls and hat
+into shape and Misel actually having the hardihood to cast an ogling
+glance at Judy. That young woman returned his admiring look with a saucy
+toss of her head, entering into the game with her usual vim.
+
+One hug for Bobby and a whisper in his ear:
+
+"The handsome dame in lavender and the lout in checks!"
+
+He in turn handed the information on to the plain clothes men, who were
+ready with their bracelets not made of gold.
+
+The arrest was made so quietly that the mother and child who were in the
+midst of it never did know what was going on, and the old lady from
+Louisiana took her serene way right by the handcuffed Madame Misel
+without knowing that that lady had had an addition made to her bangles.
+Misel was inclined to give some little trouble. When he realized they
+were trapped, he started back into the chair car, but was met in a head
+on collision by Jeffrey Tucker, who had a few football tricks left over
+from his not so far distant youth.
+
+"Get out of my way! You fool!" cried the enraged Misel.
+
+"Softly, my friend! The exit is the other way," purred the redoubtable
+Mr. Tucker, at the same time putting up his guard, seeing the foreigner
+was about to spring upon him. "Madame has gone out by the door behind
+you."
+
+Bang! Misel's fist shot out, but Jeffrey Tucker was a match for any
+ordinary boxer, having practiced that manly art to keep up with his
+daughters who always put on the gloves to settle any difficulty, and, as
+they expressed it, to let off steam when the family atmosphere got too
+thick. He dodged the blow, holding his guard ready for the next.
+
+Before the furious creature could recover himself after having given the
+empty air such a drubbing, the detectives approached him from the rear
+and in a twinkling he was overcome.
+
+"What does this mean?" he asked, attempting an air of dignity.
+
+"You shall have to come and find out!" was the laconic reply deigned him
+by the grim policeman who had him in charge.
+
+"Mr. Kean, I am sorry to tell you, but your daughter will have to come
+to the police court to tell what she knows of these persons," said the
+leader of the plain clothes men.
+
+"I'm not sorry! I want to see it through!" cried Judy.
+
+"And so, we are to thank you for this indignity," hissed Madame.
+
+"Thank me or the picturesque garden by your cottage--whichever you
+choose. It is a stirring thing to creep in that lovely garden on a
+romantic night and suddenly to see a poor lame man who has won the
+sympathy of the community, come springing out in running togs and have
+him beat Douglas Fairbanks and George Walsh in his jumping. Then to have
+the gentle, courteous Madame Misel boldly state that Wellington is
+composed of blockheads,--all in perfect German, too, which was a strange
+language for such good Frenchmen to employ in the bosom of the family."
+
+"Judy, I wouldn't say any more!" said her father, but his eye was
+twinkling as he tucked his daughter's hand under his arm.
+
+Mr. Tucker and Mr. Kean met as long lost friends. They were what Judy
+called soul brothers from the first. The old train conductor stopped to
+exchange greetings with his one-time acquaintance. He was loud in his
+praise of the young lady who had scared them all to death by jumping on
+the rear end of the moving train. He said nothing of the scolding he
+had given her before he found out she was Bob Kean's daughter.
+
+The sketch book was convincing evidence that the sporty couple were no
+other than Monsieur and Madame Misel. Judy told her story well to the
+chief, showing the clever sketches taken before and after.
+
+While they were at the police court, a long distance message was
+received from Wellington with the news that the flitting of the spies
+had been discovered by the detectives sent there on the case.
+
+"It would have been too late if you had not been so wide awake," the
+chief informed Judy.
+
+"And I could have done nothing if Mr. Tucker had not taken hold,"
+declared Judy.
+
+"Why, my dear Mrs. Brown, you would have found some other way, I am
+sure. You do not come of a breed that lets accidents happen."
+
+The Misels turned out to be pure Prussian, with not one drop of the
+blood of Alsace in their veins. Their name was Mitzel and they had many
+crimes to answer for. They had been on the stage prior to the war and
+the man was a noted acrobat and prestidigitator; the woman had traveled
+with her husband and assisted him in his work on the stage, being the
+hypnotized lady, the Herodian mystery, the disappearing spirit, the
+person who got tied up in the chest and had a sword run through
+her,--anything, in fact, that is usually required of the assistant in
+such a business. They were employed to act as spies and to disseminate
+all the German propaganda in their power.
+
+Misel, or Mitzel, was to have insinuated an anti-draft spirit at Exmoor,
+the male college near Wellington. Also to influence the girls at
+Wellington, who in their turn were to influence their brothers and
+sweethearts.
+
+"Oh, Bobby! Only suppose we had not gone out that night in search of
+adventure!" cried Judy, when she was safe under her mother's wing.
+
+"Why don't you just suppose you had never been born?" boomed the
+delighted Bobby. "When you were once born you were sure to be out
+hunting adventure. You are made that way, eh, Mother?"
+
+"Yes, I am afraid she is," sighed that tiny lady. "You and Judy are
+exactly alike."
+
+"Do you mind?" asked her big husband humbly.
+
+"No, I would not have either one of you different. But I fancy Kent and
+I are in for lives of anxiety."
+
+"Well, he likes us the way we are, too," declared Judy, blushing.
+
+"Well, I have two things to say:" declared Mr. Kean, giving a mighty
+yawn, "I am glad I let you have a Parisian education if with it you can
+make clever enough sketches to catch these German spies; and the other
+is, that it is high time we were all of us in bed."
+
+Madame Mitzel, before she was sentenced to the imprisonment that she so
+richly deserved, requested an interview with Judy, which was granted,
+although Judy was most reluctant.
+
+"I can't bear to see her again! She looked like a snake caught in a
+net."
+
+"I--want--you--to tell--Mrs. Green--that--I--am sorry for--her
+to--know--about me--That is all! If--I could--have--had a woman--like
+that--to--be--my friend--in my--youth--I would have--been different."
+She spoke in the faltering manner she had used at Wellington, one she
+employed in speaking English, and then she plunged into voluble German,
+so rapid that Judy could hardly follow her:
+
+"But you! You have outwitted me and I cannot but admire you for it, but
+I hate you with all my heart."
+
+"That is all right! I'd rather have your hate than your love! I'll tell
+Molly, though."
+
+Before we leave the Misels, or Mitzels, for good, I must tell you that
+the shipment of paint arrived at Wellington as the mysterious dealer
+had informed Monsieur Jean Misel it would. One of the Secret Service
+men remained in Wellington to receive it. It was light grey, as was
+promised; at least, it was marked light grey on the outside of the
+six large cans. On opening these cans, which I can assure you the
+detective did with the utmost caution, many things besides paint were
+disclosed,--in fact, there was no paint there at all. He found various
+chemicals, necessary for the making of the modern bomb; poisons of all
+sorts, and innocent looking little vials containing deadly germs. Those
+six cans if let loose on the unsuspecting community would have caused as
+much damage as the imps in Pandora's box.
+
+Even Molly had to confess that the Misels were not very good persons,
+and when her husband gave her to understand that her own little Mildred
+and Dodo might have been poisoned by polluted water had the foreigners
+accomplished all they no doubt intended to with some of those bottled
+germs, the young mother came to the conclusion that they were not only
+not very good but they were extremely wicked, and perhaps just
+imprisonment was too mild a punishment to be meted out to them.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+THEY ALSO SERVE
+
+
+There was a very serious meeting of students of Wellington being held in
+the library of the Square Deal. Twenty of the leading spirits of the
+student body had asked Mrs. Edwin Green to let them confer with her on a
+most important matter.
+
+The college authorities had announced that the H. C. of L. had affected
+Wellington just as it had every person and every institution, and
+students' board would have to be raised for the ensuing year. This came
+as a blow to the majority of girls. Going to college is an expensive
+matter at best, and while there are many rich girls gathered in those
+institutions, the majority come from homes of moderate incomes and many
+from actual poverty. It will never be known how many sacrifices had
+been made to educate some of those Wellington girls, and the H. C. of L.
+had affected their families just as much as it had the institution; and
+the news that the following year college expenses would increase had
+caused much consternation in the student body.
+
+"We won't stand for it!" said one tense little girl from Indiana, who
+had been working her way through three years of college by doing all
+kinds of odd jobs, which reminded Molly of her own strenuous student
+days.
+
+"It's harder on you than me, Mary Culbertson," said a sturdy sophomore.
+"You haven't but one more year. At least I haven't wasted as much time
+in this old joint as you have."
+
+"But, my dear, please don't look upon it as wasted time," begged Molly.
+
+"Well, I came for a degree and if I don't get it, I consider I have
+wasted two years. I might just as well have taken a job at home. A
+teacher's place was open for me then and now it may be filled for good.
+A degree will give one a better salary, but two years of college won't
+get you anywhere."
+
+"I am sure some scheme can be worked to keep down the expenses,"
+insisted Molly.
+
+"We can't live on less food!" bluntly declared Lilian Swift.
+
+"Nor plainer!" from a discontented one.
+
+"It might be plainer without being less nourishing," suggested Molly.
+"How about your doing some light housekeeping on your own hook and not
+trying to board with the college?"
+
+"But I am sure the college authorities do not make money on the girls
+as it is," said Billie McKym, who had come to the meeting from truly
+altruistic motives, as expenses made no difference to her personally.
+"If a great body of girls cannot be fed on the amount charged now, I am
+certain a girl could not live on less if she went in for herself."
+
+Billie, with all her wealth, had a good keen eye for business and
+understood the management of money rather better than any poor girl at
+Wellington.
+
+"I reckon you are right," said Molly sadly. "Would you girls mind if I
+ask my husband to come in and talk it over with you?"
+
+"No!" in chorus. "Bring him in!"
+
+"Not that knowing how to read Chaucer in old English will make him wise
+as how to live on nothing a year," whispered one.
+
+Professor Green was in the den with his cousin, old Major Fern, who had
+motored in from the country to have a chat with his favorite kinsman.
+Molly entered, smiling at the clouds of tobacco smoke which almost
+obscured the two gentlemen.
+
+"Edwin, I know the Major will excuse you for a moment. I need you
+badly."
+
+"Of course, my dear! But I hope it is nothing serious that is beclouding
+your fair brow," said the old gentleman with the courteous manner of his
+generation.
+
+"Yes, it is serious in a way," and Molly told her husband and his cousin
+what was the problem the girls had brought to her to solve.
+
+"Of course, I can't blame the college authorities," she sighed. "It is
+hard to feed people as it is, and with expenses going up, up, I know
+they will have to raise the board. But on the other hand, there are many
+girls who simply cannot pay more than they are already paying. I feel
+for them, as I was one of them when I was at college. If the board had
+been raised one nickel I should have had to stop. I almost had to as it
+was. If it had not been for Edwin's fondness for apples, I should have
+been degreeless to this day."
+
+"Adam and I!" laughed the professor. "But what do you want me to do,
+Molly? I am yours to command."
+
+"I don't know exactly! I thought you might talk to the girls and we
+might keep on thinking and praying until some solution is reached."
+
+"I have a proposition to make that might interest your college friends,"
+said Major Fern. "They may scorn it, but on the other hand they may like
+the idea. Let me talk to them."
+
+"Oh, how lovely! I knew there would be a way," cried the optimistic
+Molly.
+
+"Wait until you hear it first," smiled the old gentleman.
+
+Molly led the way to the library, where the twenty girls were having a
+hot discussion on ways and means. She introduced Major Fern, who took
+his seat among them and beamed on them with kindly eyes.
+
+"Ahem!" he began. "I am not much of a public speaker but I am going to
+put a plan before you and see how it strikes you. I understand that you
+are making a kick because of the raising of board for the ensuing
+year----"
+
+"We are!"
+
+"Well, you know that everything is going up?"
+
+"Everything but prayer!" from the discontented one.
+
+"Even that may be going up, too," he answered solemnly. "Now listen:
+Perhaps you know that I am rich,--not so rich as some, but richer than
+I have any right to be or any reason for being----"
+
+Here Mary Culbertson tossed her proud little head as much as to let him
+know that charity was not what she wanted. Major Fern saw her and smiled
+his approval.
+
+"I have no idea of offering any of my ill-gotten gold to you.--I know
+how you would hate that. In fact, I haven't any gold to offer. I am rich
+only in land and about as poor as they make 'em in other things. I am
+really land poor, having much more land than I have any use for or can
+till. I can't get labor to keep up my farms. I have been thinking of
+selling an especially fertile farm about four miles from Wellington, but
+I don't want to lose money on it, and if I sell at this time I am sure
+to. This farm comprises about two hundred acres of as good land as one
+can find in these parts, and that is saying a great deal. And now I am
+coming to my scheme----"
+
+The old gentleman paused while the girls waited in breathless eagerness.
+
+"I will let you have this farm if you will work it for me,--have it for
+as long as you need it. You don't know what can be done in the way of
+intensive farming if one can get the labor. You could raise enough
+potatoes to run your mess for the winter; enough tomatoes and beans to
+can, and what's more you can can them right on the spot."
+
+"Hurrah! Hurrah!" shouted Billie McKym. "The problem is solved or I'm a
+Boche."
+
+"Are you willing to undertake it?" asked the Major.
+
+"Of course we are willing!" cried Lilian.
+
+"The ones who live far can take the first part of the summer, and the
+last, just before college opens, and the ones who are close can fill in
+during the midsummer," said Molly, immediately grasping the possibility
+of the plan.
+
+"Well, I'll leave it to you young ladies to work up, and when you care
+to, I'll take you over the place. There is a good house and well and
+plenty of fruit,--apples to feed to the hogs----"
+
+"That suits me!" declared Edwin, who had been quiet while his cousin was
+unfolding the plan. "I see no reason, seriously, why this idea should
+not be wonderfully successful,--not only should it bring you back to
+college and keep you for the same, or even less, money than you have
+hitherto had to pay, but it will at the same time help materially in the
+food situation that the country is going to have to face."
+
+"Will you be one of that committee that must take hold of this thing?"
+asked Billie.
+
+"If the student body so wishes!"
+
+"Well, we so wish!" came from twenty throats.
+
+"You and Mrs. Green,--she is already one of us. As for you, Major Fern,
+we hardly know how to thank you for what you have done," said the
+president of the juniors.
+
+"Don't thank me! I have done nothing! Instead of selling a farm at a
+loss when I can't get labor to work it, I am going to ask some beautiful
+young ladies to work it for me."
+
+"We might drink him down," whispered a timid girl.
+
+"Of course! Drink him down!"
+
+And without more ado the twenty girls, with Molly chiming in and Edwin
+holding down a second, sang:
+
+     "Here's to Major Fern! Drink him down!
+      Here's to Major Fern! Drink him down!
+      Here's to Major Fern! Here's to Major Fern!
+      Drink him down! Drink him down! Drink him down!"
+
+"Fine! That beats a wreath of bay," beamed the dear old gentleman. "And
+now I'll take myself off. I forgot to say I'll have the land turned
+under for you and give the use of a team whenever you need it."
+
+He was gone. The girls, who only a few moments before had felt so
+depressed, were now filled with hope and animation. Degrees were to be
+had, after all. Of course it meant work, but that would be fun.
+
+"Oh, gee! I'm happy!" cried Mary Culbertson. "But we must get busy in a
+hurry."
+
+"First we must see Prexy and get her to cooperate," suggested Molly.
+
+"Sure! Let's do it in order, and find out if we do our part if the
+college authorities will do theirs. I dote on digging potatoes, myself,"
+said Lilian.
+
+Committees were formed immediately; one to see Prexy; one to go view
+their estate; another to look into housing conditions; another to canvas
+the student body and find out who would and who wouldn't, who preferred
+to plant and who to reap.
+
+Billie McKym was wild with enthusiasm. "Do you realize, Molly, that I
+won't have to spend a summer in Newport, after all? I can put it up to
+my relations that I am needed in these parts. I mean to ask for a larger
+allowance, though, as I can help out some on the sly. I am thinking
+about buying some Close-to-Nature houses and presenting them to the
+agricultural club. We shall have to have overalls, too,--and farming
+implements.--I think I'll make Grandmother and Uncle come across in good
+shape."
+
+Prexy, Miss Walker, was not only willing to cooperate but delighted that
+the students were finding a way out of the difficulty. It was a deep
+grief to her, this raising of prices, and she knew only too well how
+many girls would be cut out of their degrees by this necessary step.
+
+Many interviews with Major Fern had to be arranged and many meetings of
+committees had to be held, but finally everything was under way for the
+agricultural club's work on the farm so kindly donated by its delighted
+owner.
+
+"By Jove, I begin to feel that I'm helping to win the war!" he declared.
+"I have been hating myself for a useless hulk of a veteran who was too
+old to fight and too old-fashioned to suggest to others how to fight,
+but if I can be the means of keeping a lot of girls at college I think I
+am doing pretty well; especially if by so doing, those girls will grow
+food enough for themselves. Every potato is equal to a hand grenade and
+every bean to a bullet."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+THE TRENCHES
+
+
+Molly and Edwin found themselves deeper in this agricultural scheme than
+they had at first bargained for. If it was to be done at all, it must be
+well done and quickly. There must be order and system. Suddenly they
+awoke to the realization that if it was to be well done and quickly
+done, it was up to them, the Greens, to do it.
+
+"I am afraid, my dear, that you must be the chaperone and I must turn
+farmer. This is a stupendous undertaking and for the good name of
+Wellington we must see it through."
+
+"It will mean work all summer for you, when you so need a holiday, you
+poor old fellow."
+
+"I need no more holiday than you do. You haven't been idle one minute
+this whole college year. I have a feeling that this summer we have no
+business with holidays anyhow. The world is too busy, too upset for any
+of us, who are able, to lay off. I mean to dig and delve here at home
+and do all the good I can."
+
+"I think we ought to rent the Orchard Home for the summer, don't you?"
+asked Molly, turning her head away so her husband could not see what it
+cost her to make that suggestion.
+
+"Why, Molly honey, I can't bear to think of it. It is hard enough on you
+not to be able to go to Kentucky for vacation, but I don't think you
+should have to think of strangers as being among your apple trees."
+
+"It won't be bad, not nearly so bad as you think. At least, the little
+brown bungalow won't be quite so lonesome as it would be empty all the
+year, and we might buy tons of seed with the rent money or even take
+care of some war orphans."
+
+"I guess you are right,--you usually are. I'll write to a real estate
+agent in Louisville immediately and put it on the market for the summer.
+I hate to do it, though. Not that it will make so much difference to
+me. Wherever you are is my Orchard Home, honey!"
+
+The Major's farm was dubbed "The Trenches" by the members of the
+agricultural club. It was a suitable name, for these girls felt that
+they were in the war almost as much as the soldier boys themselves.
+
+Early in May Molly moved to the old farmhouse to superintend
+arrangements for the many girls later to be housed there. It was
+decided to run the place more or less as a military camp is run, with
+squads detailed for various duties.
+
+"Only our trench digging will be in the potato fields and our drilling
+in the bean patch," Billie declared.
+
+Billie was in a state of ecstasy from the first. She was General Molly's
+aide-de-camp, giving time, money, and thought to the undertaking.
+
+"It is so splendid really to be helping! I wanted to do something to
+help the Government and now I believe I am going to. I should like best
+to shoulder a gun and take a crack at the Huns, but since that cannot
+be, I'll shoulder a pick and take a crack at the soil."
+
+Billie, whose post-graduate studies at Wellington were not very
+important, had cut and gone to The Trenches with Molly. They had
+installed themselves in a corner of the rambling old farmhouse and were
+as busy as bees getting ready for the thirty girls who were to land on
+them the last week in May. Katy and the two children were with them, but
+Kizzie had been left in Wellington to look after the master, who was up
+to his neck in work for the finals at college.
+
+The students at Wellington had been canvassed from A to Z, and with a
+deal of clerical work, all of the ones who were to join the agricultural
+club had been enrolled and their time of service settled on and arranged
+for. Billie had donated six Close-to-Nature houses which were to be set
+up on the grassy lawn of the old farm. The cots she had wheedled out or
+her uncle. Farming implements, such as hoes, rakes, spades, gasoline
+ploughs and cultivators she had, as she expressed it, "blasted out of
+Grandmother McKym."
+
+"They don't understand me in the least, my uncle and my grandmother, but
+they love me, I really believe, and I fancy they always hope I'll come
+to my senses and marry in 'the set' some of these days. They are really
+dears," Billie explained to Molly as they helped to unload the wagons
+that had just arrived laden with the tents and implements.
+
+"I think they are certainly very generous," declared Molly, pulling out
+a bundle of rakes.
+
+From the beginning these girls had determined not to be dependent upon
+the merely masculine to fetch and carry for them, and Molly and Billie
+had pitched in with a will to do without men if need be.
+
+"Oh, yes, generous enough! They are glad when I let them off with
+nothing more troublesome than writing checks. I believe Uncle Donald was
+scared stiff that I might insist on his coming down here to help dig.
+And as for Grandmother,--she would rather ante up thousands of dollars
+than have to drag her silk skirts around in the wet grass here at The
+Trenches. They don't see for an instant that I am kind of patriotic in
+helping this way. They think I am just a faddist. Maybe I am, but
+somehow I feel that I have ideals! Do you think I am just a silly goose
+to think so?"
+
+"No, indeed! I know you have ideals,--I should hate to think you
+didn't,--very high ideals," said Molly, as together they wheeled the
+barrow laden with hoes and rakes out to the tool house. "I reckon your
+uncle and grandmother have them, too, only perhaps they are not so open
+about them."
+
+"Oh yes, they have them. Uncle Donald loves to talk about them, but
+Grandmother isn't so keen on expressing herself. Sometimes I think his
+ideals are mostly literary and hers sartorial. He is a great reader of
+_belles lettres_ and Grandmother has an instinct for clothes that is
+truly remarkable."
+
+"You have it, too."
+
+"Well, I do like 'em, but I like to dress other persons better than I
+do myself. If I had been poor, I'd have gone into the business. I may do
+it yet, but now until this war is over it seems to me it doesn't make a
+bit of difference how anyone is dressed--anybody but Mother Earth. The
+soil dressed with a good fertilizer is more important than silk
+raiment."
+
+"How about literature?" laughed Molly, her friend's enthusiasm amusing
+her and at the same time pleasing her. "Do you think writing should stop
+as well as dressing?"
+
+"Oh, of course scribblers will scribble and anyone who has a message to
+deliver will have to spout it out, war time or not, but they may not
+think they are so all-fired important. A letter from the most ignorant
+soldier at the front will have more real stuff in it than all of the
+vaporings of the poet who only imagines gunfire."
+
+"And here far from the strife----"
+
+"Here we will make sonnets with hoe and rake!"
+
+"Our lines made by the gasoline plough shall be beautiful and
+harmonious!" suggested Molly.
+
+"Our onion patch shall be worthy to be put into verse along with Eugene
+Field's Onion Tart," said Billie, going Molly one better.
+
+"Our potato field shall be as full of solid refreshment as Charles
+Dudley Warner's five feet of classics. Only smell the newly-ploughed
+earth! Isn't it delicious?"
+
+The wagons were unloaded, the farming implements piled neatly in the
+tool house and the Close-to-Nature houses dotted about the lawn ready
+for the stupendous task of being put up. The girls were waiting for
+Katy, whom they had dubbed "the powerful Katrinka," to come help them
+with that job. Katy was in her element. She had been born and raised in
+the country, and now that she was once more where things were growing,
+where she could help them grow, she was as happy an Irish girl as there
+was in all the land. Nothing was too difficult for her to do and her
+great strength helped Molly and Billie out of many a quagmire of work
+that seemed too heavy for them to accomplish without masculine aid.
+
+"And now Oi'm ready for to help put oop the little play houses," she
+said as she joined Molly and Billie.
+
+"That's fine," said her mistress, "but before we begin, just let's smell
+the ploughed ground a little. Don't you love it, Katy?"
+
+"Sure! And it beats the perfumery that comes in a bottle, to my moind,"
+said the girl, sniffing delightedly.
+
+"I don't see why they don't bottle the smell of new ploughed earth just
+as they have new mown hay," laughed Billie. "I know two who would want
+to buy it."
+
+"Deed and Oi'd buy a gallon of sooch smells!"
+
+"Do you know Masefield's 'Everlasting Mercy,' Billie? You and Katy
+listen while I tell you the part about ploughing and then we'll put up
+the tent houses."
+
+Very charming was the picture made by this group of girls. So Edwin
+Green thought as he walked silently across the lawn of the old farm.
+Katy, the sturdy Irish girl, was not without picturesque lines. Her look
+was somewhat that of Bastien Lepage's peasant Jeanne d'Arc as she stood
+in rapt reverie while her beloved mistress gave voice to those wonderful
+lines of England's greatest modern poet. Billie looked very down-to-date
+in her khaki overalls and stubby shoes, while Molly was very Mollyesque
+in the blue linen blouse that was the only true Molly Brown blue.
+
+She did not hear her husband as he stepped lightly across the green
+spring grass and he motioned to Billie not to let her know he was there.
+He stood silently, with bared head while she recited. Molly's voice had
+always appealed to Edwin, in fact it had been the first thing that had
+attracted him--and when Molly recited poetry!
+
+    "'The past was faded like a dream;
+      There came the jingling of a team,
+      A ploughman's voice, a clink of chain,
+      Slow hoofs, and harness under strain.
+      Up the slow slope a team came bowing,
+      Old Callow at his autumn ploughing,
+      Old Callow stooped above the hales,
+      Ploughing the stubble into wales.
+      His grave eyes looking straight ahead,
+      Shearing a long straight furrow red;
+      His plough-foot high to give it earth
+      To bring new food for men to birth.
+
+    "'O wet red swathe of earth laid bare,
+      O truth, O strength, O gleaming share,
+      O patient eyes that watch the goal,
+      O ploughman of the sinner's soul.
+      O Jesus, drive the coulter deep
+      To plough my living man from sleep.
+
+    "'Slow up the hill the plough team plod,
+      Old Callow at the task of God,
+      Helped by man's wit, helped by the brute,
+      Turning a stubborn clay to fruit,
+      His eye forever on some sign
+      To help him plough a perfect line.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "'I kneeled there in the muddy fallow,
+      That I should plough, and as I ploughed
+      My Savior Christ would sing aloud,
+      And as I drove the clods apart
+      Christ would be ploughing in my heart,
+      Through rest-harrow and bitter roots,
+      Through all my bad life's rotten fruits.
+
+    "'O Christ, who holds the open gate,
+      O Christ, who drives the furrow straight,
+      O Christ, the plough, O Christ, the laughter
+      Of holy white birds flying after,
+      Lo, all my heart's field red and torn,
+      And thou wilt bring the young green corn,
+      The young green corn divinely springing,
+      The young green corn forever singing;
+      And when the field is fresh and fair
+      Thy blessed feet shall glitter there,
+      And we will walk the weeded field,
+      And tell the golden harvest's yield,
+      The corn that makes the holy bread
+      By which the soul of man is fed,
+      The holy bread, the food unpriced,
+      Thy everlasting mercy, Christ.'"
+
+Katy wiped her eyes and Billie winked away the tears that would gather.
+Molly turned and saw Edwin standing only a few feet from her.
+
+"Oh, Edwin, I didn't know you were there. I declare I haven't been
+spouting poetry ever since we got here! We have done a lot and were
+going now to put up the tent houses, but you aren't to help. I'll give
+you some tea and let you rest up after your tramp. We weren't expecting
+you until Saturday----"
+
+"And don't want me now?"
+
+"Want you! Why, Edwin Green, B. A., M. A., P. H. D.! You know I always
+want you," and then Billie and Katy thought it was time to leave the
+married lovers alone for a while.
+
+"I want to help put up the houses, though," insisted Edwin as he and
+Molly wended their way to a pretty little arbor covered by a crimson
+rambler that gave promise, if one might judge from the many buds, of
+being a glorious sight later in the season.
+
+"But we can do it later by our lonesomes. You don't know how many things
+we can do without the help of men, especially when one of us is as
+powerful as Katy and one as spunky as Billie."
+
+"And how about you?" and he pinched her rosy cheek.
+
+"Oh, I'm not much force, I am afraid, but I have the bump of
+stickativeness which is sometimes as good as strength and takes the
+place of cleverness."
+
+"Do you really think you girls could run this farm without the help of a
+man?"
+
+"Of course we could, once the heavy ploughing is done, and Katy says she
+could have done that, too, if we had wanted her to. Do you want to go
+off on a trip somewhere and let us try to run it without you?"
+
+Edwin looked searchingly into Molly's blue eyes. His gaze was long and
+earnest and in his brown eyes Molly read a kind of sadness she had never
+seen there before.
+
+"Edwin, dearest, what is it?"
+
+"Molly, it isn't anything unless you want it to be."
+
+"Tell me!"
+
+"Would you think it right or wrong if I should try to get into the
+service, military service, I mean?--I have taken an examination and am
+physically fit.--I won't apply to go into training at Fort Myer unless
+you approve.--It rests entirely with you, honey."
+
+"You must go if you think it right." Molly spoke without a tremor,
+although it did seem to her for a moment as though her heart would
+burst. How could a heart get so big all of a sudden? And then it seemed
+to her she was sounding cold and unemotional when Edwin wanted something
+else. "I--I--want you to go! I think it is right for men just like you
+to go--men with brains and the power of taking hold and leading--I
+wouldn't have you stay behind for me for anything on earth. I--I--am
+proud of you and want you to do exactly what you think is right,
+and--and--I think you are right--just as right as can be--and--and--I
+love you more than ever."
+
+It seemed to both Edwin and Molly that at no time since their walk in
+the forest of Fontainebleau when the eternal question had been settled
+between them had any moment been so filled with love and understanding
+as now when he folded her in his arms. His Molly! His own, brave, true
+Molly! Her Edwin! Her honorable, courageous Edwin!
+
+"I thought that I could content myself by digging and delving, but
+somehow I have been feeling lately that if you would consent, it was up
+to me to do something else. I don't feel critical in the least towards
+the men of my age who are not going to the war,--not the younger ones,
+either, if they do not feel called upon,--but somehow when one has been
+called as I have, I think he should answer. I don't know why a staid
+college professor should think it is his vocation, but I do think it,
+and, oh, dearest, it is good of you to take it this way!"
+
+"I could take it no other way. Is not my mother giving God-speed to her
+sons? Is not Judy encouraging Kent? Is not Nance not only sending Andy
+but going with him? Who am I that I should say you shall and you shan't
+do things for your country?"
+
+"But you see, dear girl, there are the children to take care of in
+case--in case--in case I should--should--well--stump my toe."
+
+"I can take care of them as my mother did of all of us. My father died
+when I was a tiny child and still my mother raised me. But don't stump
+your toe. Pick up your feet when you walk--and--and----"
+
+Here Molly came very near shedding the tears that she felt must be shed
+sooner or later, but she was determined that it should be later and that
+her soldier boy should not see them. She jumped up and offered to race
+him to the house where Katy was laying the tea table on the porch.
+
+Edwin knew Molly too well not to understand that this gaiety was nothing
+but camouflage to conceal emotions that she was too brave to show.
+
+"What will your mother think?"
+
+"She will think that I have married well," was her gay rejoinder.
+
+"And what does my Mildred think when I tell her her daddy is going to be
+a soldier?" he asked as he held the little girl close in his arms.
+
+Mildred had been busy with a tiny hoe and shovel on a patch of ground
+given over to her tender ministrations. Her hands were very grubby and
+her face not much better, but Edwin seemed not to mind the general
+griminess of his daughter.
+
+"Oh, I say bully for Daddy! An' I bet if Dodo'll wake up, he'd say he
+was a-goin', too. Boys is so rombustious."
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+And now we must leave Molly Brown and her College Friends at the
+momentous hour when their country is plunged in a great and righteous
+war. What the future holds for them is as much a mystery as what it
+holds for any of us. One thing is sure: Molly is doing her duty,--doing
+it cheerfully and bravely. Around her are college girls and more college
+girls, each one doing her bit. And so the fields are ploughed, the crops
+are planted and gathered. Fruit and vegetables are preserved and canned.
+The men and boys are training for the trenches, but the women and girls
+are in training, too.
+
+Molly often thinks of that moment when she stood sniffing the up-turned
+mould, with her husband standing near listening to her as she recited
+the lines from Masefield; and now as the days multiply she finds comfort
+in Masefield's ending to "The Everlasting Mercy":
+
+    "'How swift the summer goes,
+      Forget-me-not, pink, rose.
+      The young grass when I started
+      And now the hay is carted,
+      And now my song is ended,
+      And all the summer spended;
+      The blackbird's second brood
+      Routs beech leaves in the wood;
+      The pink and rose have speeded,
+      Forget-me-not has seeded.
+      Only the winds that blew,
+      The rain that makes things new,
+      The earth that hides things old,
+      And blessings manifold.'"
+
+
+THE END
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+  The
+  Girl Scouts
+  Series
+
+BY EDITH LAVELL
+
+
+A new copyright series of Girl Scouts stories by an author of wide
+experience in Scouts' craft, as Director of Girl Scouts of Philadelphia.
+
+Clothbound, with Attractive Color Designs.
+
+PRICE, 65 CENTS EACH.
+
+  THE GIRL SCOUTS AT MISS ALLEN'S SCHOOL
+  THE GIRL SCOUTS AT CAMP
+  THE GIRL SCOUTS' GOOD TURN
+  THE GIRL SCOUTS' CANOE TRIP
+  THE GIRL SCOUTS' RIVALS
+  THE GIRL SCOUTS ON THE RANCH
+  THE GIRL SCOUTS' VACATION ADVENTURES
+  THE GIRL SCOUTS' MOTOR TRIP
+
+For sale by all booksellers, or sent postpaid on receipt of price by the
+Publishers
+
+            A. L. BURT COMPANY
+  114-120 EAST 23rd STREET    NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+  Marjorie Dean
+  High School
+  Series
+
+BY PAULINE LESTER
+
+Author of the Famous Marjorie Dean College Series
+
+
+These are clean, wholesome stories that will be of great interest to all
+girls of high school age.
+
+  All Cloth Bound      Copyright Titles
+
+PRICE, 65 CENTS EACH
+
+  MARJORIE DEAN, HIGH SCHOOL FRESHMAN
+  MARJORIE DEAN, HIGH SCHOOL SOPHOMORE
+  MARJORIE DEAN, HIGH SCHOOL JUNIOR
+  MARJORIE DEAN, HIGH SCHOOL SENIOR
+
+For sale by all booksellers, or sent postpaid on receipt of price by the
+Publishers
+
+            A. L. BURT COMPANY
+  114-120 EAST 23rd STREET    NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+  Marjorie Dean
+  College
+  Series
+
+BY PAULINE LESTER.
+
+Author of the Famous Marjorie Dean High School Series.
+
+
+Those who have read the Marjorie Dean High School Series will be eager
+to read this new series, as Marjorie Dean continues to be the heroine in
+these stories.
+
+  All Clothbound.      Copyright Titles.
+
+PRICE, 65 CENTS EACH.
+
+  MARJORIE DEAN, COLLEGE FRESHMAN
+  MARJORIE DEAN, COLLEGE SOPHOMORE
+  MARJORIE DEAN, COLLEGE JUNIOR
+  MARJORIE DEAN, COLLEGE SENIOR
+
+For sale by all booksellers, or sent postpaid on receipt of price by the
+Publishers.
+
+            A. L. BURT COMPANY
+  114-120 East 23rd Street    New York
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+  The Camp Fire
+  Girls Series
+
+By HILDEGARD G. FREY
+
+
+A Series of Outdoor Stories for Girls 12 to 16 Years.
+
+  All Cloth Bound      Copyright Titles
+
+PRICE, 65 CENTS EACH
+
+  THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS IN THE MAINE WOODS; or, The Winnebagos go
+          Camping.
+
+  THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS AT SCHOOL; or, The Wohelo Weavers.
+
+  THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS AT ONOWAY HOUSE; or, The Magic Garden.
+
+  THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS GO MOTORING; or, Along the Road That Leads
+          the Way.
+
+  THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS' LARKS AND PRANKS; or, The House of the Open
+          Door.
+
+  THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS ON ELLEN'S ISLE; or, The Trail of the Seven
+          Cedars.
+
+  THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS ON THE OPEN ROAD; or, Glorify Work.
+
+  THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS DO THEIR BIT; or, Over the Top with the
+          Winnebagos.
+
+  THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS SOLVE A MYSTERY; or, The Christmas Adventure at
+          Carver House.
+
+  THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS AT CAMP KEEWAYDIN; or, Down Paddles.
+
+For sale by booksellers, or sent postpaid on receipt of price by the
+Publishers
+
+A. L. BURT COMPANY
+114-120 EAST 23rd STREET    NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's note:
+
+A few minor printer's errors have been corrected. Otherwise the
+original has been preserved, including inconsistent spelling and
+hyphenation.
+
+
+
+***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MOLLY BROWN'S COLLEGE FRIENDS***
+
+
+******* This file should be named 36733.txt or 36733.zip *******
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