Nan Sherwood's Summer Holidays Part 6

Before the tea was poured, Laura, as chairman of the gift committee, called her to her side, and, in the name of all those present, put three boxes in her hands and told her to open them. From the first, Nan pulled forth a gay corsage of daffodils which Bess promptly pinned to her shoulder. How pretty they looked there! So yellow and bright! Nan looked down at them, seeming for a moment to forget her other gifts.

Bess prodded her. So did Laura. Nan murmured a pardon and picked up another box. It was the largest of the three, much longer and wider than the first and was tied with a big perky bow which Nan proceeded to untie, oh, so slowly, it seemed to her friends, for in her confusion her fingers fumbled over the knot. Finally, however, the ribbon was off, the cover removed, the tissue paper pulled aside, and Nan drew forth a lovely long satin negligee, more beautiful than any she had ever seen.

"How lovely!" she exclaimed and buried her face for a second in its softness, for she was so happy that she was almost crying. Then she looked out at all the faces watching her.

"Oh, I thank you, many times I thank you," she said, before she looked down at the robe again. It was hard to tear her eyes away from it. But at another prod from Bess, she looked down at the third package on the table near her. "Could it be--?" She opened it and pulled forth the cleverest pair of little bedroom slippers! Everything was just perfect!

Nan smiled shyly at her friends. "What could she say?" In the pause that followed, Dr. Prescott came to her rescue, moved over closer to her, and, standing between her and Bess, she spoke.

"May I have the attention of all of you, for a moment?"

Immediately, everyone was quiet, expectantly waiting.

"What was coming?" The question was in everyone's mind. The girls looked at Dr. Beulah and then at one another, as a million answers rushed through their heads.

She smiled rea.s.suringly into their puzzled faces, seemed about to speak, but then paused as though to choose her words carefully. Finally, she began.

"I don't know as I have ever," she said, "been prouder of Lakeview Hall and all it stands for than I have today, and today somehow marks a turning point in its history.

"You all know that my life has been bound up in the fortunes of this place for some years now. When I first came here, there were about twenty-five girls registered. We taught a little French, some music, fine needlework, literature, and something of the social graces. Walking was about the most strenuous of the sports for girls in those days.

Hiking was unheard of, for young ladies, I mean. It was considered quite the thing to grow pale and to faint on the slightest provocation, that is, if the young lady did it gracefully.

"Nan here would have been quite out of place in that old school with her bobbed hair, her keen enjoyment of all the sports, and her interest in Professor Krenner's cla.s.s in architectural drawing."

The girls laughed. Although the course had been listed in Lakeview Hall's catalogue ever since Professor Krenner joined the faculty, Nan had been the first to actually elect the subject. The story of how and why she did had long ago become a campus joke as those who have read "Nan Sherwood at Lakeview Hall" are well aware.

Now, for the first time Nan herself began to see how really queer that listing "Architectural Drawing" must have looked when it first appeared on the catalogue. She giggled, as she thought of young women with long dresses that trailed along the gravel paths of the campus taking such a serious course.

Sharing the joke with Dr. Beulah, she smiled up at her.

"Yes, Nan would have been quite out of place there," Dr. Beulah repeated. "Not one among those twenty-five girls was trained to take care of herself. Here, today in the very hall where they sometimes gathered for their lessons in "The Social Graces" and practiced entering and leaving the room, using that door over there," she said, nodding toward the doorway from which Nan had first viewed the surprise party, "you girls of the modern day have planned a party for one of your number who has had more adventures than those girls had ever dreamed or read about.

"Whereas they walked, danced some, and fainted most expertly, you go boating, hiking, horseback riding, and, in the winter, sleighing. You play basketball and volleyball and golf. How they would envy you! Now, your party is for one among you who is going to Europe. There, all sorts of adventures await her. Just as Nan cannot imagine what these will be, just as I could not have twenty years ago imagined this big school with its two hundred self-reliant girls, you young ladies in planning this party had no conception of what a big thing was going to happen to you shortly.

"While you have been whispering and plotting among yourselves looking forward to this day which is being so successful, I, too, have been fostering a few secrets."

At this Bess looked over at Nan. There was an I-told-you-so gleam in her eye. Nan nodded quickly. They were both thinking of their conversation of a few days ago in the corridor, both remembering their disappointing encounter with the old mailman. They turned their eyes back toward Dr.

Beulah's face. How sweet she looked! Nan sighed. If she would only hurry and get to the point of her talk! Nan felt that she simply could not wait any longer.

"Nan's parents," Dr. Beulah continued, "felt that they wanted her to go to Europe under the chaperonage of some responsible person, and so, several months ago they wrote to me."

This was news to Nan, and she was all attention as Dr. Beulah went on.

"I made inquiries of the schools and colleges which offer conducted tours and was about to recommend that Nan join a party from a girls'

school on the Hudson that was going to England. However, before the letter was written to Mr. and Mrs. Sherwood, Grace Mason's mother asked me a question that has changed everyone's plans."

Rhoda Hammond put a rea.s.suring arm around Grace, who blushed slightly as all eyes were turned on her.

"She and Mr. Mason," the head of the school explained, "wondered whether it would be possible for me to recommend a girls' camp for Grace to stay in for the summer. Well, one thing led to another, and before the week was out Professor Krenner and I were in conference behind closed doors.

"As a result, plans have been definitely made," her voice was clear and firm in spite of the excitement in it, "for a whole party of you to go to England this spring to see the king and queen crowned in London!"

CHAPTER VI

ADVENTURES AHEAD!

There was a murmur of surprise in the room as Dr. Prescott made her announcement. She raised her hand to quiet it and waited a moment before she went on.

"Much as I would have liked to have all of you go," she continued finally to the expectant girls before her, "that was impossible. So, it was necessary to choose those girls who have been outstanding in one way or another since they have been here at school. Another year, there will be more of you able to go, for I hope on this trip to be able to establish contacts that will make exchange scholars.h.i.+ps between Lakeview Hall and similar schools abroad, possible. Therefore, to those who have that keen desire to make the trip, to be explorers too, and do not find their names on the list which I shall read presently, I want to say, 'Don't be too disappointed.'

"Most of you are younger than the girls who have been chosen, and your opportunity will come when you are a little older. Then you may profit by the experiences that we shall have on this first trip, yes, and by our mistakes too, for, in a sense, we shall be explorers setting out for strange countries. We are going to find out for sure whether the things we have been reading and hearing about for these many years are true. We are going to see whether, if we board a boat in New York and sail east, we really come to a continent called Europe on our maps.

"Those of you who follow after, will but verify our findings and will have as strange and wonderful experiences then, as we shall have now.

So, again I say, you will not be the girls I think you are, if you do not, after the list is read, rally round those girls who are going. Help them all you can. There is much to do between now and the time they sail, and they and the school will need your help.

"Now after conferences with your parents and teachers, I have chosen and secured permission for the following six girls to go: Nan Sherwood, Amelia Boggs, Grace Mason--"

The room was tense with suspense as she paused to clear her throat, for she was excited too, almost as excited as the girls themselves.

"Rhoda Hammond--" She smiled over at the girl, for she was fond of this proud southern girl, so different, she thought, than the rest of her brood.

"Laura Polk and--"

Nan put her arm around Bess' shoulder. The same question was in both their minds. Could it be possible that Bess' name was not on the list?

"Elizabeth--Harley!"

The room was in a hubbub. Nan was kissing Bess and Bess kissing Nan; Rhoda, shaking hands with Laura; Laura, telling Grace not to cry; Dr.

Beulah Prescott, looking as though her customary serenity was most difficult to maintain; and Professor Krenner was smiling his kindly smile on all of them.

Everyone shook hands with everyone else and the girls that weren't going were so lifted up by the excitement that they hardly knew who was going and who was not. In the commotion, Rhoda somehow or other managed to pour the tea, and Amelia, Bess, Nan, Laura, and Grace to pa.s.s the sandwiches and olives and pickles and cakes and nuts and candies, but no one, as Rhoda dolefully remarked afterwards, knew what they were eating.

"The refreshment committee could have served mounds of spinach," she said, "instead of molded boats of ice-cream, and no one would have been the wiser." Maybe so. At any rate, the little round sandwiches, the long narrow sandwiches, and the sandwiches shaped like b.a.l.l.s and covered with cheese, were all eaten to the last crumb. The olives, pickles, and nuts disappeared. Finally, the ice cream and fancy cakes were all gobbled up, too, so that when the matron of the Hall had the maid wheel out the tea-wagon, none of Rhoda's refreshments were left.

It was quite the nicest party Lakeview Hall had ever had. That night no one slept very soundly, least of all the six girls on Corridor Four who were going to England for the Coronation of the King and Queen.

All rules, Dr. Prescott, had wisely said, would be suspended for the one night. Though Mrs. Cupp shook her head lugubriously over the "goings on", at ten o'clock that night Laura, Grace, Amelia and Rhoda found themselves by one accord collected in Bess and Nan's room.

"What if it's all a dream?" Rhoda asked as they lounged about on the day-bed and in the easy chairs. "What if we awaken tomorrow and find that none of it's true, that it is as we thought when we planned the party in the first place? What if we find that only Nan is going after all?"

"That wouldn't be a dream. That would be a nightmare," Laura answered.

"The thing I can't understand is, how I managed to get in under the wire. I was never more surprised in all my life than I was when she read my name. Imagine me, the red-headed cyclone from nowhere, going to Europe. Even my well-known imagination fails at the prospect. I can believe some of my own stories quicker than this one that the powers that be have thought up. Truth is indeed stranger than fiction. I never thought that I would live," she said as though she was at least a hundred, "to see the day when I would admit that."

"Nor did I either," Nan said contentedly. How pleased she was that all her friends were going! "Remember the night we sat up like this in this very room and talked of going to Florida. We thought nothing could be so grand as that! Now the whole lot and caboodle of us," she went on inelegantly, "are going on a little jaunt over to Europe."