CHAPTER II: CAROLYN ARRIVES
"Carolyn!" exclaimed Betty and Kathryn in one breath. Both girls jumpedup and ran toward the pavement where Carolyn, trim and pretty, and stillin her traveling suit, was lightly and quickly leaving the car, lookingback for a word or two with its occupants and then, smilingly, coming tomeet her two friends.
"Am I still on your list of friends?" she asked, holding Betty off afteran embrace. "Kathryn, I don't deserve to have such a nice welcome and Iknow it! Will you girls ever _forgive_ me for not writing?"
It was the old Carolyn. My, but she was sweet. Betty knew why, "all overagain," as she said to herself--why she loved Carolyn Gwynne.
"Do you have to do anything for ten minutes or so?" continued Carolyn,walking between the girls to the porch and being escorted, not to thesteps, but to a hanging swing in which they all could sit.
"Not a thing," Betty assured her, "and for more than ten minutes, Ihope, if you are mentioning how long you can stay."
"They'll be back for me," said Carolyn. "We came most of the way bytrain, but were met, and I asked to drive around this way in case Ishould see anything of Betty, to make my peace with her--and here areboth of you. I'm positively afraid to meet Peggy Pollard. I owe her twoletters, and I don't owe you girls but one! And oh, I've the grandestplan for next summer. Positively, you've both got to begin planning nowto come to our camp with me. Even if I didn't write, I thought ofyou--every time I went in swimming, Betty--or almost, to be realtruthful--I could see you in your bathing suit, cutting the 'dashingwaves' or rolling in the sand with me."
"I'd love 'rolling in the sand' with you, Carolyn," laughed Betty, "butI've had a perfectly delicious summer at home. I am, of course, _verymuch offended_ at you for not having answered my letter; but I'm afraidI can't keep it up because there's so much to talk about. Kathryn, canyou stay mad at Carolyn?"
"Never could," smiled Kathryn. "Carolyn gets away with a lot of thingsshe forgets because she is so nice about remembering some more importantthings."
"There!" exclaimed Carolyn. "You're a friend worth having, Kathryn!" AndCarolyn wondered at the affectionate glance, full of meaning, that Bettygave Kathryn. It was generous of Kathryn to praise Carolyn, in view ofher acknowledged bit of jealousy.
"Betty, I laughed and laughed over that letter. It was too clever forwords. And the funny things that happened to you! How do people everkeep house and remember all the things that they have to be carefulabout? I suppose it's nothing unusual to have somebody at the back door,a ring at the front door, the ice man coming and all while a body istalking at the telephone and trying to get an important message, but youcertainly made it funny. 'Hello, hello--yes, Father--I don't quite getthat--where did you say to meet you?--mercy, there is the ice man andsomebody else is knocking, too and the door-bell is ringing--what'll Ido?--you can't hold the 'phone?'--something like that, Kathryn. And you_must_ have been scared the time you forgot to keep the screen doorfastened and that agent walked right in."
"Yes," laughed Betty. "I thought he was taking a gun from his pocket andI backed toward the front room door, ready to run, while he fixed mewith his awful eye, and then asked me if I wanted to buy whatever hehad. I didn't even look at it. I gasped out, 'No, sir,' and then I heardwhat I had on the gas stove boiling over and knew it would put out thegas; so I turned and fled, and when I came back the man was gone andnothing was missing!"
"How soon can you girls come out? I'll be unpacking tomorrow and thehouse will be upset while things are getting back into shape again, butthe day after that--oh, have you heard about Louise Madison, and TedDorrance?"
Carolyn's manner was so impressive as she asked this question thatBetty's heart gave a little leap. What could be the matter! An accident?
"What about them?" asked Kathryn, "married?"
"Not a bit of it. Just the other way. My sister heard all about it.Somebody wrote to her from the same summer resort where the Dorrancesand the Madisons _happened_ to be together. Somebody that goes to theUniversity was there, too, and paid a lot of attention to Louise; andshe liked it--and him, of course--and you may imagine what Ted thoughtabout it. So all at once Ted left and went somewhere else, with someboys from here, and the girl that wrote to sister claims that Louise isengaged to the other man, though we don't believe it. Louise is only afreshman in college!"
"You never can tell, Carolyn," wisely returned Kathryn. "Louise is sortof flirty anyhow. And, for that matter, Ted is pretty nice to all thegirls, only since he has been taking Louise around there's been nobodyelse."
"It seems too bad," remarked Betty, pondering. "They are both so nice. Ithought it so romantic last year."
"I never thought it could last," said Carolyn, "from what my sister saidthen. You see, Louise is older than Ted and a year ahead of him inschool; and it doesn't stand to reason that when she is with all theseUniversity people next year, in the same classes, and the boys likingLouise the way they always do--that Ted would have much of a chance."
"But Ted is a very unusual boy," Betty insisted.
"Ted _is_ one of those boys that everybody likes," Carolyn assented."Well, we'll let him look after himself. Kathryn, did you hear thatFinny is coming back to join her more democratic sisters in thesophomore class?"
"Yes. I was just telling Betty about her. Do you know why she decided tocome back to high school?"
"I wouldn't say anything about it except to you two and Peggy, becauseit wouldn't be fair to Mathilde not to let her have a chance to make herown reputation in high school; but I'm pretty sure, from all the reallymean things I heard said about her, that even 'discounting' the truth ofsome of them, as the person that repeated the most said to me, theschool where she was didn't exactly appreciate her. Besides, she failedin several branches and had to make up what she could this summer. Butshe'll be a sophomore all right. Now, please don't tell a word of this.I wouldn't want it to come from me, or be mean to Mathilde, though I'mgoing _very slowly_ in that direction!"
This from kind Carolyn was a good deal, as Betty knew. Still, in theexcitement of the return and news telling, girls were likely to say toomuch.
"We'll say nothing," replied Kathryn. "At least I can promise formyself, and you know Betty."
"Oh, how did violin practice go, Betty? You didn't say a word about itin your letter. It didn't 'harmonize,' to be very musical in myspeech--with washing dishes and cooking and having company did it?"
"Not so very well, Carolyn, but I really did a little bit every day andI played for Father and he liked it. He would, you know, because I wasdoing it, though I will say that Father couldn't stand a discord or arasping bow. Jazz makes him nearly crazy when the discord lasts toolong, you know. He took Cousin Lil and me to a movie and got up andleft, asking me if I'd mind first. I whispered that he could stop hisears while the jazz lasted, but he shook his head; and when we gotoutside there was Father waiting to take us into where we could get asundae. He said he had accomplished several errands."
"Think you will get into the orchestra?"
"That is another thing. I did want to, you know. But I found out that Icouldn't be a real member until I was a junior, unless I was a genius orsomething so wonderful that they had to have me. I was told that thissummer, so my energy lagged in the hot weather. Father said he was sorrybecause I 'lacked an incentive,' but I don't know. I like violin anyhow,and maybe it's just as well not to feel hurried and lose all yourdreams."
"Now isn't that like you, Betty! That's one reason I like you," Carolyndeclared, "because you do have 'dreams.'"
Carolyn looked at Kathryn as if for confirmation of her speech andKathryn nodded with a wide smile.
"I'm very practical, though, girls. I'm not sure that having dreams isaltogether good, either."
"First you say one thing and then you say another," Kathryn accused her."It's as bad as saying it the way Mr. Simcox answers our questions:'Well, _yes_; and _no!_'"
Kathryn had so nearly presented their teacher's voice and intonationthat Carolyn and Bett
y answered with giggles. But Kathryn went on tosay, with real seriousness underlying her fun, "What we should say aboutBetty is that she is hitching her wagon to a star and it makes everybodyelse want to hitch up, too."
"'Inspiration,' then," said Carolyn. "What'll I hitch up with? Icouldn't play a violin."
"_As_piration," chuckled Betty. "Pick out your brightest dream, 'Caro,'and put on the harness!"
"She calls me 'Caro.' What kind of syrup do you like best, Betty?"
"'Scuse me, Carolyn. I felt affectionate and had to make up a nickname."
"You are excused. Really, we might have made some little names of ourown to call each other by. Wouldn't it be fun?"
Betty looked mischievously at Kathryn. "We were talking of nicknamesthis afternoon, Kathryn and I."
"Betty!"
Carolyn looked from one to another. "You have some secret. That is mean,to leave out your old and tried friend Carolyn."
"Oh, it wasn't anything, Carolyn, only I'm joking Kathryn about anickname she doesn't like."
"I'm not so sure now but I _do_ like it," Kathryn replied, taking upBetty's half explanation. "Tell Carolyn if you want to."
"Not all of it?"
"Yes, what Peggy is supposed to have said."
Upon this permission from Kathryn, Betty explained that a speech ofPeggy's had been repeated by Mathilde to Kathryn and how the gypsyreference had been interpreted. "Do you think that Peggy Pollard wouldbe likely to say anything unkind about Kathryn?" Betty asked inconcluding.
"I can't imagine it. Kathryn, notice how Peggy acts when you see her andif I were you I'd feel around with some reference to something of thesort. I'll wager you'll find Peggy as ignorant as can be of even whatyou mean. You'll find out that Peggy Pollard is all right. And by theway, I hear that they are having little sororities in spite of therules. If it is all right, and the authorities allow it, why not?There's one in our class started! The question is who started it, andwhy, and how, and if so, can we make it, and do we want to make it----"
Carolyn was obliged to stop for breath.
"Hum," said Kathryn. "Yes, I've heard about it, but I didn't tell Betty.I heard Betty's father say that he was glad there weren't any sororitiesin high school!"
"Poor Mr. Lee!" exclaimed Carolyn. "Betty, do you know what you're goingin for this year--swimming, I suppose?"
"Oh, yes. But no, I haven't thought about it. I took everything withsuch seriousness last year; but if I want to, I'll sign up for a numberof things this year. They don't meet often, and you can always stop ifyou can't keep on, and I'd love to be on some team, if there'd be notrouble about it."
"There's always trouble about making a team. There are too many thatwant to be on it."
"But you can try out, and if you stand better than somebody else, youget it and she doesn't. That _oughtn't_ to make trouble."
"Why don't you try out for the hockey team in the fall and thebasketball in the winter?"
"Perhaps I will. Wait till the time comes. Oh, there's your car,Carolyn. What a shame!"
"Yes, and I haven't made a date with you at all."
"There's always the telephone," Betty reminded her. "It was lovely ofyou to stop, Carolyn. See you soon. Come back as soon as you can. 'Bye!"
Betty Lee, Sophomore Page 2