The Bacillus of Beauty Part 11

--I found that I compared favourably enough with my mates. Dress played little part in every day college life, and for such occasions as socials or Friday night debating society I soon learned from upper cla.s.s girls to mitigate ugly gowns with pretty ribbons. And I congratulated myself upon the fact that I was not by any means the plainest girl in my cla.s.s. My face was hopeless, but my hard-won fight for an erect posture had given me a bearing that seemed almost distinguished. And--well, even my face wasn't so bad, I thought then!

We were a jolly set; most of us poor as church mice, and caring little.

Making rather a boast of it, indeed. John Burke's roommate, Jim Reeder, cooked his own meals--mostly oatmeal--in his room and lived on less than a dollar a week until fairly starved. I suppose they'll call him "old Hoss"

to his dying day. Until his mother moved to town, John was almost as ill- fed. He was just completing his law course when I was a Freshman, and used to make brave jests at poverty, even after his admission to the bar.

Of course I was glad to meet him again, and, though I was puzzled just at first, to see how little older than I my former teacher was, yet afterwards--why, I haven't answered his last--I don't know how many letters; I simply must remember to write to him!

I think the best part of the teaching wasn't in the books. Some of the students were queer and uncouth when they came, the boys eating with their knives in the fas.h.i.+on of the farm; some of the brightest girls in ill- fitting clothes--perfect guys they'd be thought in the city. But there were others of quite different manner, and from them and from professors who had seen the world, we learned a little--a very little--of its ways.

And perhaps we were not unfavourable specimens of young republicanism, with our merry, hopeful outlook upon life, and our future governors and senators all in the raw--yes, and our countesses and vice-reines!

CHAPTER IV

GIRL BACHELOR AND BIOLOGIST

Merrily flew the years and almost before I realised it came graduation. In the leafy dark of the village street, in the calm of a perfect June night, John Burke told me that he loved me, and I plighted my troth to him.

We laid plans as we bade each other good-by, to meet again--perhaps--in New York in the fall; and even that little separation seemed so long. We did not guess that the weeks would grow to months, and--oh, dear, what will he think of me when he gets here? And what--now--shall I say to him?

Father for the first time visited college to see me graduate. Between his pride in my standing at the head of my cla.s.s and his discomfort in a starched collar, he was a prey to conflicting emotions all Commencement week, and heaved a great sigh of relief when at last the train that bore us home pulled out of the station. But as we approached our own he again grew uneasy, and kept peering out at the car window as if on the watch for something.

At length we descended in front of the long yellow box we called the "deepo." And there was Joe Lavigne to meet us, not with the democrat wagon, but with a very new and s.h.i.+ny top buggy.

When we reached the farmhouse, I saw proofs of a loving conspiracy. The addition of a broad veranda and a big bay window, with the softening effect of the young trees that had grown up all around the place, made it look much more homelike than the bare box that had sheltered my childhood.

A new hammock swung between two of the trees.

Mother met me at the door with more emotion than I had ever before detected upon her thin face. Then I saw that the dear people had been at work within the house as well. Cosey corners and modern wall paper and fittings such as I had seen at the professors' houses and had described at home to auditors apparently slightly interested, had been remembered and treasured up and here attempted, to make my homecoming a festivity. The house had been transformed, and if not always in the best of taste, love shone through the blunders.

"Oh, Father," I cried, "now I am surprised! How much wheat it must have cost!"

"Well, I guess we can stand it," he said, grimly pleased and proud and anxious all at once. "We wanted to make it kind o' pleasant for ye, Sis; an'--an' homelike."

There was something so soft and tremulous in his voice that it struck me with a great pang of contrition that I had left him for so many years, that already I was eager to go away again--to the great city where John was soon to be.

I turned quickly away and went from room to room admiring the changes, but after supper, when we were all gathered about the sitting room table, Father returned to the subject most upon his mind. He had seen me with John during Commencement week, and must have understood matters.

"Ready t' stay hum now, I s'pose, ain't ye?" he asked with a note in his voice of cheery a.s.surance that perhaps he did not feel, tilting back and forth in his old-fas.h.i.+oned rocking chair, as I had so often seen him do, with closed eyes and open mouth, his face steeled against expression. And the slow jog, jog, jog of the chair reminded me how his silent evening vigils had worn away the rockers until they stood flat upon the floor, making every movement a clacking complaint.

To-night--to-night, he is rocking just the same, in silence, in loneliness. Poor, dear Pa!

"I'm glad to get home, of course," I said; "but--I wanted to speak with you. But not to-night."

"Why, ye're through school."

"Yes, but I--I wish I could go on studying; if I may."

The words tripped over each other in my embarra.s.sment.

The jog, jog of the chair paused suddenly, leaving for a moment only the ticking of the clock to break the silence.

"Not goin' to put up 'ith us an' stay right alon', eh?" he asked; and rocked twice, then stopped again, in suspense for the answer.

"Why, Father," I stammered, "of course I don't want to do anything unless you're willing, but I had thought I'd like--I did want to go and study in the city--I think--or somewhere."

"Dear me! Dear me!" he mused, his voice very low and even; "an' you just through the University; 'way up to the top, too. Can't ye--seems as if ye better stop alon' of us an' study home, same's you used to? Mebbe--mebbe 'twon't be good for ye, studyin' so much."

"Of course I can, you dear old Dad," I cried; and horribly guilty I felt as I looked at the kindly, weather-beaten face. "I shall do just whatever you say. But oh, I wish I _could go to the city_! Don't you suppose I could?"

"Chicago, mebbe?"

"I had thought of a post-graduate course in Barnard College--that's in New York, you know."

Father knew John's plans. I blushed hotly. In the pause that followed I knew that he was thinking of a well-thumbed map in my old school geography; of the long, long journey to Chicago, and the thousand weary miles that stretched beyond. Hastily I went on:--

"But I know how you have saved for me and worked for me and pinched; and I'd be ashamed to be a burden upon you any longer; I can teach to get money to go on with."

"No;" said Pa, sitting up straight and striking the arm of the chair with his clenched fist a blow that gave some hint of the excitement that moved him. "Guess a child o' mine don't need to teach an' get all dragged out, alon' of a pa.s.sel o' wild children! No, no, Helen 'Lizy;" he added more softly, sinking back into the old att.i.tude and once more closing his eyes; "if the's so much more to learn, an' you want to go ahead an' learn it, just you go an' get it done with. I'm right sorry to have ye go so fur away; I did think--but it's nat'ral, child; it's nat'ral. I s'pose John Burke's goin' to the city, too, and you kinder--I s'pose young folks likes to be together."

"I--I--we have talked of it."

Talked about it! John and I had talked of nothing else for a week. I sat very still, my eyes on the carpet.

"Guess John Burke'll have all he cares to do for one while, gittin'

started in the law office, 'thout runnin' round with Nelly," said Ma. "Ye seem bent on spoilin' the child, Ezry. Al'ays the same way, ever sin'

she's a little girl."

Her lips were compressed, the outward symbol of a life of silent hours and self restraint.

"There, there, Ma," said Father, jogging his chair again. "Don't ye worry no more 'bout that. What's ourn is hern in the long run, an' she may as well have some of it now when she wants it, an' it'll do her some good. I s'pose Frank Baker--she that's your mother's cousin an' married Tim'thy Baker an's gone to New York to live--I s'pose she might look after you; but it's a long way off, New York--seems like a dretful long way off. What ye goin' to learn, Sis, if ye should go t' the city?"

"Well, I was good in chemistry; Prof. Meade advised me--I might study medicine; I don't know. And I want to know more about books and pictures and the things that people talk about, out in the world, though I can hardly call that a study, I suppose."

The words somehow disappointed me when uttered. They didn't sound convincing. Such pursuits seemed less serious, there in the old farm-house that spoke of so much painful toil, than when John and I had discussed them on the sunny campus.

"I--I don't know yet, just what to do; there's all summer to plan; but I want--somehow--to make the very most and the best of myself," I added earnestly.

It was true, and the nearest I could come to the exact truth; that love urged me yet more eagerly upon the Quest, and that with all my heart I longed to become a wise and brilliant woman, for John's sake, and as a step towards beauty, according to Miss Coleman's words.

"I don't hold with women bein' doctors," said Ma, as she energetically knitted into the middle of her needle before looking up. "I don't know what we're comin' to, these days."

"There, there, Ma, I don't know why women shouldn't be doctors, if they want to. They make better nusses'n men. Mebbe--mebbe Sis'll be gettin'

married some day, an' I tell ye a little doctorin' know-how is mighty handy in a house. A doctor an' a lawyer, now, would be a gret team, right in the fambly, like. Well, Sis, we'll see; we'll see."

I knew that the matter was practically settled; and there was little sleep for me, or for any one, that night in the old farm-house.

I stayed at home until September, and then one morning Father drove me again to the little yellow station whose door opens wide upon all the world.