CHAPTER XIII
GEORGIA'S AMETHYST PENDANT
"Has your man come yet, Lucy?"
"Mine hasn't, thank goodness! He couldn't get off for the afternoon."
"Mine thought he couldn't and then he changed his mind after I'd refusedall the teas."
"Oh, I wouldn't miss the teas for anything. They're more fun than theconcert."
"Of course she wouldn't miss them, the dressy lady, with violets to wearand a new white hat with plumes."
"The Hilton is going to have an orchestra to play for dancing. Isn'tthat pretty cute?"
"But did you hear about Sara Allen's men? They both telegraphed her lastevening that they could come,--both, please note. And now she hasn't anyseats."
So the talk ran among the merry crowd of girls who jostled one anotherin the narrow halls after morning chapel. For it was the day of theGlee Club concert. The first installment of men and flowers was alreadybeginning to arrive, giving to the Harding campus that air of festiveexpectancy which it wears on the rare occasions when the Harding girl'shighest ambition is not to shine in her classes or star in thebasket-ball game or the senior play, but only to own a "man."
Tom Alison and his junior roommate arrived at the Belden soon afterluncheon. Tom looked so distinguished in a frock coat and high hat thatBetty hoped her pride and satisfaction in taking him around the campusweren't too dreadfully evident.
Ashley Dwight was tall, round-shouldered, and homely, except when hesmiled, which he did very seldom because he was generally too busymaking every one within hearing of his low voice hysterical withlaughter over his funny stories. He took an instant fancy to Georgia,and of course Georgia liked him--everybody liked Ashley, Tom explained.So Betty's last worriment vanished, leaving nothing to mar theperfection of her afternoon.
The Hilton girls' brilliant idea of turning their tea into a dance hadbeen speedily copied by the Westcott and the Belden, and the otherhouses "came in strong on refreshments, cozy-corners, and conversation,"as Ashley put it. So it was six o'clock before any one dreamed that itcould be so late, and the men went off to their hotels for dinner,leaving the girls to gloat over the flower-boxes piled high on thehall-table, to gossip over the afternoon's adventures, and then hurryoff to dress, dinner being a superfluity to them after so many saladsand sandwiches, ices and macaroons, all far more appetizing than acampus dinner menu.
"I'll come down to your room in time to help you finish dressing," Bettypromised Georgia. "My things slip on in a minute."
But she had reckoned without a loose nail in the stair-carpet, which,apparently resenting her hasty progress past it, had torn a yard offilmy ruching off her skirt before she realized what was happening.
"Oh, dear!" she mourned, "now I shall have to rush just as usual. HelenChase Adams, the gathering-string is broken. Have you any pink silk? Ihaven't a thing but black myself. Then would you try to borrow some? Andplease ask Madeline to go down and help Georgia. Her roommate is goingrush to the concert, so she had to start early."
Helen had just taken the last stitches in the ruffle and Betty wasputting on her skirt again, when Tom's card came up to her. By the timeshe got down-stairs they were all waiting in the reception-room and Mr.Dwight was helping Georgia into her coat and laughing at the chiffonscarf that she assured him was a great protection, so that Betty didn'tsee Georgia in her hated evening gown until they took off their wraps atthe theatre.
"Awfully sorry I couldn't come to help you," she whispered, as they wentout to the carriage, "but I know you're all right."
"I did my little best not to disgrace you," Georgia whispered back. "Myneck is horribly bony, no matter what mother thinks; but I covered someof it up with a chain."
When they got to the theatre, almost every seat was filled and a prettylittle usher hurried them through the crowd at the door, assuring themimportantly over her shoulder that the concert would begin in oneminute and she couldn't seat even box-holders during a number. Sureenough, before they had fairly gotten into their places, the Glee Clubgirls began to come out and arrange themselves in a rainbow-tintedsemicircle for the first number. They sang beautifully and looked sopretty that Tom gallantly declared they deserved to be encored on thataccount alone; and he led the applause so vigorously that everybodylooked up at their box and laughed. Alice Waite had the other seats init, and as the three men were friends and all in the highest spirits, itwas a gay party.
"There's Jerry Holt," Tom would say, "see him stare at our elegance."
"Oh, we're making the rest of the fellows envious all right," Ashleywould answer. "Who's the stunning girl in the second row, next theaisle? We don't miss a thing from here, do we?"
"Prettiest lay-out I've ever seen, this concert is," Alice's escortwould declare fervently. "Sh, Tommie, the banjo club's going to play."
And then they would settle themselves to watch the stage and listen tothe music for a while.
"It's all good, but what I'm looking forward to is this," said AshleyDwight, pointing out the Glee Club's last number on his program. "Ican't wait to hear 'The Fames of Miss Ames.'"
"The what?" asked Betty, consulting her card. "Why, Georgia Ames, is itabout you? Did you know they were going to have it?"
Georgia nodded. "The leader came and asked me if I cared. She seemed tothink it would take, so I told her to go ahead. But I didn't realizethat this concert was such a big thing," she added mournfully, "and Ididn't know I was going to sit in a box."
"Pretty grand to be sitting in a box with the celebrity of the evening,isn't it, Ashley?" said Tom.
And Ashley said something in a low voice to Georgia, which made herlaugh and blush and call him "too silly for anything."
Finally, after the Mandolin Club had played its lovely "Gondolier'sSong," and the Banjo Club its amusing and inevitable "Frogville Echoes,"the Glee Club girls came out to sing "The Fames of Miss Ames," which aclever junior had written and a musical sophomore had set to a catchymelody. A little, short-haired girl with a tremendous alto voice sangthe verses, which dealt in witty, flippant fashion with the career ofthe two Georgias, and the whole club came in strong on the chorus.
"And now she's come to life, (Her double's here). And speculation's rife, (It's all so queer). The ghost associations, Hold long confabulations, And the gaiety of nations Is very much enhanced by Georgia dear!"
It was only shameless doggerel, but it took. Topical songs always takewell at Harding, and never had there been such a unique subject as thisone. Between the verses the girls clapped and laughed, nodded atGeorgia's box, and whispered explanations to their escorts; and when atlast the soloist answered their vociferous demands for more with asmiling head-shake and the convincing statement that "there wasn't anymore--yet," they laughed and made her sing it all over.
This time Georgia asked one of the men to change seats with her, andslipped quietly into the most secluded corner of the box, behind Betty'schair, declaring that she really couldn't stand it to be stared at anylonger. She looked positively pretty, Betty thought, having a chance forthe first time to get a good look at her. The sparkle in her eyes andthe soft color in her cheeks that the excitement and embarrassment hadput there were very becoming. So was the low dress, in spite of the factthat Georgia was undoubtedly right in considering herself a "shirt-waistgirl." Her neck wasn't particularly thin, or if it was the lovely oldchain that she wore twisted twice around it kept it from seeming so.Betty turned to ask her something about the song and noticed the pendantthat hung from her chain. It was of antique pattern--an amethyst in aring of little pearls, with an odd quaint setting of dull gold. Itlooked familiar somehow. It was--yes, it was just like Nita Reese's lostpin--the one that belonged to her great grandmother and that haddisappeared just before the Belden House play--one of the first theftsto be laid to the account of the college robber. Only, instead of a pinthis was a pendant, fastened to the chain by a tiny gold ring. That wasthe only difference, for--yes, even the one little pearl that Nita hadlost of
the circle was missing here.
Betty didn't hear Georgia's answer to her question. She turned back tothe stage, which swayed sickeningly as she watched it. At last the songended, and while she clapped mechanically with the rest she gave herselfa little shake, and told herself sternly that she was being a goose,that it was absurd, preposterous, even wicked--this thought that hadflashed into her head. Nita's pin wasn't the only one of its kind; theremight be hundreds just like it. Georgia's great grandmother probably hadhad one too.
Betty talked very fast on the way up to the Belden. She was thankfulthat Tom and his friend were going back to New Haven that night andwould have time for only the hastiest of good-byes.
"See you later, Miss Ames," Ashley Dwight called back as he ran down thesteps after Tom.
"He's asked me to the prom, Betty. Think of that!" explained Georgia,her eyes shining.
"How--nice," said Betty faintly. "I'm awfully tired, aren't you?"
"Tired!" repeated Georgia gaily. "Not a bit. I should like to begin allover again this minute. I'm hot though. We walked pretty fast up thehill." She threw back her coat and unwound the scarf that was twistedover her hair and around her throat. It caught on the amethyst pendantand Georgia pulled it away carefully, while Betty watched in fascinatedsilence, trying to make up her mind to speak. She might never have agood chance again. Ordinarily Georgia wore no jewelry,--not a pin or aring. She had certainly never worn this pendant before at Harding. Itwould be so easy and so sensible to say something about it now and sether uncomfortable thoughts at rest.
Betty wet her lips nervously, made an heroic effort, and began.
"What a lovely chain that is, Georgia." She hoped her voice sounded morenatural to Georgia than it did to herself. "Is it a family heirloom?"
Georgia put up her hand absently, and felt of the chain. "Oh,that,--yes, it is. It really belongs to mother, but she let me bring ithere. She's awfully fond of old jewelry, and she has a lot. I hate allkinds, but this covers my bones so beautifully."
"The pendant is lovely too," put in Betty hastily, as Georgia moved offtoward her room. "Is that old too?"
"I don't know," said Georgia stiffly. "That isn't a family thing. It wasgiven to me--by somebody I don't like."
"The somebody must like you pretty well," said Betty, trying to speaklightly, "to give you such a stunning present."
Georgia did not answer this, except by saying, "Good-night. I believe Iam tired," as she opened her door.
Up in her own corridor Betty met Madeline Ayres. "Back so soon?" saidMadeline, who refused to take Glee Club concerts seriously. "I've hadthe most delicious evening, reading in solitary splendor and eatingapples that I didn't have to pass around. I'm sure your concert wasn'thalf so amusing. How did Georgia's song go?"
"Finely," said Betty without enthusiasm. "Did she tell you about itwhile you helped her dress?"
"No, for I didn't help her. I went over to the Hilton right afterdinner. Lucile told me, in a valiant attempt to persuade me that I wasfoolish to miss the concert."
"Oh," said Betty limply, opening her own door.
Madeline hadn't seen the pendant then. Probably some freshman who didn'tknow about Nita's loss had helped Georgia to dress. Well, what did thatmatter? She had Georgia's own word that the pin was a gift. Besides itwas absurd to think that she would take Nita's pin and wear it righthere at Harding. And yet--it was just the same and the one little pearlwas gone. But a person who would steal Nita's pin, wouldn't make apresent of it to Georgia. Then the pin couldn't be Nita's.
"I'm getting to be a horrid, suspicious person," Betty told the greenlizard. "I won't think about it another minute. I won't, I won't!"
And she didn't that night, for she fell asleep almost before her headtouched the pillow. Next morning she woke in the midst of a longcomplicated dream about Georgia and the green lizard. Georgia had stolenhim and put a ring around his tail, and the lizard was protestingvigorously in a metallic shriek that turned out, after awhile, to be theBelden House breakfast-bell jangling outside her door.
"They never ring the rising-bell as loud as that," wailed Betty, whenshe had consulted her clock and made sure that she had slept over.Before she was dressed Georgia Ames appeared, bringing a deliciousbreakfast tray.
"Helen said that you have a nine o'clock recitation," she exclaimed,"and I thought you probably hadn't studied for it and would be in adreadful hurry."
Betty thanked her, feeling very guilty. Georgia was wearing a plainbrown jumper dress, with no ornament of any kind, not even a pin tofasten her collar; and she looked as cool and self-possessed andcheerful as usual. In the sober light of morning it seemed even morethan absurd to suppose that she was anything but a nice, jolly girl,like Rachel and K. and Madeline,--the sort of girl that you associatedwith Harding College and with the "Merry Hearts" and asked to boxparties with a nice Yale man, who liked her and invited her to his prom.
In the weeks that followed Betty saw a great deal of Georgia, who seemedintent on showing her gratitude for the splendid time that Betty hadgiven her. Betty, for her part, felt that she owed Georgia far more thanGeorgia owed her and found many pleasant ways of showing her contritionfor a doubt that, do her best, she couldn't wholly stifle. The more shesaw of Georgia, the more clearly she noticed that there was somethingodd about the behavior of the self-contained little freshman, and alsothat she was worrying a good deal and letting nobody know the reason.
"But it's not conditions or warnings or anything of that sort,"Georgia's round-eyed roommate declared solemnly to Betty, in a burst ofconfidence about the way she was worrying over Georgia. "She sits andthinks for hours sometimes, and doesn't answer me if I speak to her. Andshe says she doesn't care whether she gets a chance to play in the biggame or not. Just imagine saying that, Miss Wales."
"She's tired," suggested Betty loyally. "She'll be all right aftervacation."
Meanwhile, in the less searching eyes of the college world, Georgiacontinued to be the spoiled child of fortune. She came back from theprom, with glowing tales of the good times she had had, and whether ornot she cared about it she was the only "sub" who got a chance to playin the big game. She made two goals, while Betty clapped for herfrantically and her class made their side of the gallery actuallytremble with the manifestations of their delight.
It was just as Betty was leaving the gym on the afternoon of the gamethat Jean Eastman overtook her.
"Could you come for a walk?" she asked abruptly. "There is something Iwant to get settled before vacation. It won't take long. It's aboutBassanio," she went on, when they had gotten a little away from thecrowd. "I want to give up my part. Do you suppose Mary Horton would takeit now?"
"You want to give up Bassanio?" Betty repeated wonderingly.
"Yes. There's no use in mincing matters. I did have a condition inFrench, and Miss Carter was tutoring me, just as you thought. I hadworked it off the day I answered your note, but of course that doesn'talter anything. They say mademoiselle never hands in her records for onesemester until the next one is almost over, so nothing would have cometo light until it was too late for a new person to learn the part. Don'tlook so astonished, Betty. It's been done before and it may be doneagain, but I don't care for it myself." Then, as Betty continued tostare at her in horrified silence, "If you're going to look like that, Imight as well have kept the part. The reason I decided to give it up wasbecause I didn't think I should enjoy seeing your face at the granddenouement. You see, when you and Eleanor came in that afternoon Ithought you'd guessed or that Barbara Gordon and Teddie Wilson, who knewof a similar case, had, and had sent you up to make sure. But afteryou'd apologized for your note and squared things with Eleanor, I--well,I didn't think I should enjoy seeing your face," ended Jean, with alittle break in her voice. "I--told you I had a sense of honor, and Ihave."
Betty put out her hand impulsively. "I'm glad you changed your mind,Jean. It's too bad that you can't have a part, but you wouldn't want itin any such way."
"I did though," said Je
an, blinking back the tears. "I knew it wouldcome out in the end,--I counted on that, and I shouldn't have mindedMiss Stuart's rage or the committee's horror. But you're so dreadfullyon the square. You make a person feel like a two-penny doll. I don'twonder that Eleanor Watson has changed about a lot of things. Anybodywould have to if they saw much of you."
Betty's thoughts flew back to Georgia. "I wish I thought so."
"Well," said Jean fiercely, "I do. That's why I've always hated you. Ipresume I shall hate you worse than ever to-morrow. Meanwhile, will youplease tell Barbara? I can't help what they all think, and I don't care.I only wanted you to see that I've got a little sense of obligationleft and that after I've let a person apologize--Don't come any further,please."
Jean ran swiftly down the steep path leading to the lower level of theback campus and Betty turned obediently toward home, feeling very smalland useless and unhappy. Jean's announcement had been so sudden and soamazing that she didn't know what she had said in response to it, andshe was quite sure that she hadn't done at all what Jean expected. Thenthis confirmation of her suspicions about Jean gave her an uneasyfeeling about Georgia. That baffling young person was just leaving thegym as Betty got back to it, and the sight of her surrounded by a bevyof her admiring friends reassured Betty wonderfully. Nevertheless shedecided to go and see Miss Ferris. There was something she wanted to askabout.
After half an hour spent in Miss Ferris's cozy sitting-room, she startedout to find Barbara, armed with the serene conviction that everythingwould come out right in the end.
"How do people influence other people?" she had demanded early in hercall. "There is some one I want to influence, if I could, but I don'tknow how to begin."
"That's a big question, Betty," Miss Ferris assured her smilingly. "Ingeneral I think the best way to influence people is to be ourselves thethings we want them to be--honest and true and kind."
Betty mused on this advice as she crossed the campus. "That was a gooddeal what Jean said. I guess I must just attend to my own affairs andwait and let things happen, the way Madeline does. This about Jean justhappened."
She passed Georgia's door on her way up-stairs. The room was full ofgirls, listening admiringly to their hostess's reminiscences of theafternoon. "That sophomore guard was so rattled. She kept saying, 'Iwill, I will, I will,' between her teeth and she was so busy saying itthat she forgot to go for the ball. But she didn't forget to stick herelbow into me between times--not she. I wanted to slug her a little justfor fun, but of course I wouldn't. I perfectly hate people who don'tplay fair."
Betty went on up the stairs smiling happily. She wanted to hug Georgiafor that last sentence.
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