Carney's House Party and Winona's Pony Cart

by Maud Hart Lovelace

  “When you play for me after we’re married, I want you to be good!”

  He didn’t even mind that she had to go back early. He thought it was splendid that she was to be one of those outstanding juniors in white dresses, with rose and gray ribbons and badges, who would be welcoming the freshmen.

  On Labor Day Mr. Sibley proposed that they take Sam on a picnic. The Sibleys had many family picnics. It was time Sam was initiated, Mr. Sibley said. The boys whooped with joy, and Mrs. Sibley and Carney packed a lunch. Mr. Sibley carefully got out his reflector oven.

  They went to Two Falls Park. As they walked toward the bridge, memories of the earlier picnic there caused Carney’s dimple to flicker. Sam whispered to her, “Don’t you wish I were a baseball star?”

  The day was as warm as summer, but the waterfall was now only a spun-silver thread. There were touches of yellow in the trees lining the canyon. There were red vines garlanding some of the trees. The wild grapes would be ripe, Mr. Sibley said.

  As they unpacked the basket, a flock of yellow-headed blackbirds crossed the horizon, headed south.

  “How about some hunting this fall?” Sam asked Jerry and Bobbie. “There’ll be lots of ducks on Murmuring Lake. And I’ve got a couple of extra guns.”

  Sam made the fire. He was good with his hands. It burned up brightly, but according to Mr. Sibley’s exact instructions he let it die down. Mr. Sibley mixed the corn cake, equal parts of yellow corn meal and flour, and egg and milk. He put the tin in the reflector oven and while it was baking he fried bacon and eggs, and Sam made coffee.

  Carney laid out plates and cups, knives and forks and spoons, on a blue cloth. She poured glasses of milk and heaped platters with doughnuts, peaches, plums. She smiled all the time.

  After eating they talked about nature. They always did, Carney told Sam; her father knew a lot about it. They watched a squirrel storing nuts and Mr. Sibley told them about the habits of squirrels. Mr. Sibley explained how the ironwood tree got its name—because it was so hard. He showed them how tough the ironwood sapling was. Jerry tried to break one, but he couldn’t. Bobbie begged his father to make him a willow whistle. Whistles, Mr. Sibley explained wisely, belonged to the spring when the willow bark slipped off easily.

  Later they all played “duck on a rock”; even Mrs. Sibley played. Sam ran so fast when Mrs. Sibley knocked his duck off, that she said she thought he could beat Dan Patch.

  After “duck on a rock” Bobbie brought out the football, and he and Sam kicked it around.

  “Bobbie thinks he owns Sam!” Carney said to her mother with irritation.

  But presently Sam remarked to Bobbie that there were lots of chokecherries on the trees up on the hill. He offered him a nickel for a capful. Bobbie ran off, and Sam and Carney did just what Winona and Dennie had done. They went down below the falls and threw sticks and watched them sail away; they threw more and followed them.

  They were talking about a trip they were going to make to Minneapolis. He had offered to drive her and her mother up for shopping. He wanted Carney to meet that favorite prof. He wanted to take her to a concert, too, if the Orchestra was playing, and explain the instruments.

  “And I want to take you to a bootmaker.”

  “For heaven’s sake, why?”

  “I’m going to have him make you some hiking boots. Girls never get the right kind. This fellow will make them to my order, and I can get exactly what I want.”

  “But what do I want hiking boots for?” Carney asked.

  “For our honeymoon. That is, if you’d like to go to the north woods.”

  “And camp? Oh, Sam! I’d love it!”

  “I’ll do the cooking.”

  “But I like to cook. I’m a good cook.”

  “If we get to fighting about it, we’ll let our Indian do it.”

  “Are we going to have an Indian?” Carney asked excitedly.

  “You bet. Indian guides are fine on honeymoons. They don’t pay a bit of attention to you.”

  Carney’s dimple twinkled again. “You’ve been on so many honeymoons!”

  “Well, I’m going on one two years from next June.”

  “Unless there’s a war or something,” she joked. She knew, as everyone did, that there was never going to be another war. Wars belonged only to history classes.

  “There’s something I want to get for you besides boots,” said Sam. He spoke haltingly. “It’s a ring. I have one all picked out, a whopper.”

  “Sam!”

  “But I’m not going to…that is…I’m waiting to dig up some money. I’m getting to be a regular miser, saving to buy that ring. I won’t charge it, but it’s hard for me, Carney, to let you go East without it. All the guys you’ll be meeting at dances, and your left hand perfectly empty…” He stopped.

  “You don’t need to worry,” Carney said. She felt like crying. There was something else she wanted to say, but it was always hard for Carney to be romantic. She swallowed hard and made herself say it.

  “You don’t need to worry. When I love someone, I love someone,” she said.

  20

  Sunset Hill Again

  THE CAMPUS SEEMED STRANGE without Isobel, Win, Sue, and Peg. Only Winkie of the Tower crowd had been called back to serve on the Reception Committee. And it seemed strange not to be living in Main any more—but juniors never lived in Main. On the day of room-drawing last spring, Carney and Isobel had been given two rooms and a sitting room in Lathrop. They would be together again, at least.

  The rooms smelled of varnish and looked unnaturally neat, as dormitory rooms always did at the beginning of the year. They wouldn’t look right until she and Isobel got out their banners and pictures, their pillows and books, the tea set with the spirit lamp. And Carney didn’t want to do any of that until Isobel arrived because settling was such fun. Besides, her trunk had not come. She had only the suitcase which she had carried herself from the Poughkeepsie station to the trolley.

  The little bobtailed trolley had been filled with girls she knew. None of them belonged to her gang, but they were Vassar girls and so they seemed like friends. They had climbed off at the Old Lodge Gate, and Carney had carried her suitcase beneath the clock on to the campus.

  The tall Norway spruces stood like majestic ladies. The maples were turning their coppery gold, and scarlet vines covered some of the buildings. The campus had looked even more beautiful than she remembered it.

  She had changed into a middie blouse and skirt, and was unpacking when Winkie came in.

  “Hi there! Carney!” she cried.

  She looked just the same; so small that she was almost topheavy under her big blond braids. Her face was one jubilant smile. Carney was very glad to see her. They went outside and sat down on the steps.

  The air was full of the scent of evergreens.

  “It smells like college,” Carney remarked, sniffing. “Do you know, this place grows on you.”

  “You really glad to be back?”

  “I really am. But we had a wonderful summer. I guess you know all about it from our letters.”

  Winkie said she did, and Carney was relieved. The summer had moved so far away; it didn’t seem to be the thing to talk about, sitting on the steps of Lathrop. And she didn’t want to tell the news of Isobel’s engagement. Isobel would want that pleasure herself.

  Carney had a plan. She thought they would give a spread, the night the gang got back, to announce both their engagements. She would tell Isobel about her own first, of course. Isobel would have her diamond, and Carney wouldn’t, but she didn’t care. She loved not having her diamond.

  “You’ve been down to the Circle, I suppose?” she asked. The Athletic Circle, where they played tennis and basketball, was the center of college for Winkie.

  “Not yet. I’ve been trailing my trunk.”

  “I’m anxious to get back to the music building,” Carney said. “To my horse stall!” She chuckled. “It will seem good to be starting piano again.”

  “I
want to lay in some Whitman’s Instantaneous Cocoa.”

  “And I have to collect Suzanne from Professor Bracq.”

  “Did you bring back the dress suit?”

  “You bet I did. What would you all do for masculine company if I didn’t have my dress suit?” Winkie grinned. “When do we start looking after freshmen?” Carney asked.

  “We get our instructions tomorrow,” said Winkie. “Then we pin on those badges and start shoving the children around—to the Lady Principal’s office, and the Secretary’s office, and the Treasurer’s office.”

  “There’s nothing so deaf as an adder,” Carney put in. It was a joke the old treasurer always made when they tried to talk while paying their bills. “I suppose the freshmen will be feeling awfully strange, just as we did.”

  “Remember how we all hit it off the first night at supper?”

  “I should say I do! It’s too bad the whole gang couldn’t get into Lathrop this year, but we’ll stick together.”

  “No doubt of that,” Winkie said. She stood up. “Well, I guess I’ll run down to the Circle, see what sort of shape the courts are in. Want to come along?”

  “I have to unpack,” Carney replied. “I’ll meet you at the Class Tree in an hour.”

  When Winkie was gone she tossed a coin to see who would get which bedroom. They were both small, exactly alike. Then she unpacked and settled in her usual orderly fashion. She had learned in previous years to put a roll of shelf paper and scissors in her suitcase. She lined all the bureau drawers, Isobel’s as well as her own.

  She put away her toilet articles and hung her night gown and kimono in the closet. There was left Bleak House which she had been reading on the train, her Bible, and her photographs.

  Larry’s photograph had stood on her desk for two years. And she hated the way some girls gave the place of honor to a different picture every year.

  “I’m going to put Larry right back where he always was,” she said aloud, and placed him on her desk.

  She picked up Sam’s picture and held it in her hands a moment. Looking at his smiling eyes, his firm mouth, and the dimple in his chin, she knew that he would be the one to whom she would say good night and good morning. She realized that wherever Sam’s picture stood would be the place of honor. It made her think of that Frenchman who had said that wherever he sat was the head of the table.

  She put Sam’s picture on the bureau, and went out into the crisp bright air.

  It was wonderful to have this free day before her duties with the freshmen began. She was so busy during the school year that she never saw enough of the campus and the adjoining woodlands. She wanted to stroll around the Pine Walk, and go down to the brook, and up Sunset Hill.

  “I believe I’ll go up Sunset Hill right now. There’s time before I meet Winkie,” she thought.

  On the lower slopes the grasses were full of goldenrod and asters, thistles and Joe Pye weed. A few dried yellow leaves were drifting down from Matthew Vassar’s ancient apple trees. The apples were ripe, but they were very small.

  She came to a bench with a view of the brook, the roofs of the college, and the flag on Main, but she kept on climbing. She went through a thicket of tall dark pines, past the outdoor theatre, along a path bordered by wine-red sumac, to the summit and the bench she loved.

  Carney sat down and looked off at the rolling blue hills. This was the bench to which she always brought her problems. She didn’t have a problem at the moment, but it was nice to be here anyway.

  The last time she had come she had been trying to decide whether to invite Isobel to Minnesota. She was glad she had invited her. She hadn’t grown to love her as she loved Bonnie and Betsy. A girl just didn’t love Isobel that way. She was too much like that smiling and inscrutable Mona Lisa who had been stolen last month from the Louvre Museum in Paris. Carney liked her, though; she had enjoyed her. And it had been darn nice of Isobel to tell Sam that Carney had turned down Larry. But would she have done it if it hadn’t been for Howard Sedgwick? Carney would never know.

  “I’ll never understand her,” she thought.

  It didn’t matter, because Sam had preferred her to Isobel. Sam’s choosing her had built up her self-confidence more than any one thing had ever done. Larry had liked her. He would have proposed if she had let him. Perhaps she could even have made him fall in love if she had tried. But Sam had picked her out all by himself.

  Her junior year was starting, and everyone said it was the nicest year of all. It was starting wonderfully, for tomorrow she would be standing on the steps of Main in a white dress with rose and gray ribbons and a badge, a member of the distinguished Reception Committee. Juniors looked after freshmen all through the year because they were sister classes. The junior party for freshmen would be coming along soon. And the juniors and the freshmen would be singing together every night before Chapel on the steps of Strong. Last year, as sophomores, her class had sung with the seniors at Rockefeller.

  Change! Change! Life was full of change, but the gang would stick together and classes would go on.

  It would be good to see Miss Salmon. How surprised she would be if she could know how much she had influenced Carney’s life! Miss Chittenden might take her to play for Matthew Lang again, and he could say all he liked against her playing, but she would remember what Sam had said:

  “Probably your husband will hound you to play for him every night after supper. Of course, as the kids grow older, you’ll play less and less. But you won’t feel bad about that for one of the kids will be musical, maybe…”

  And he would look like Sam!

  Carney jumped up. She wanted to run down to her room and write to Sam before she met Winkie. It was amazing! She used to write to Larry on a certain day every week, and it never occurred to her to write at any other time. But she was always wanting to write to Sam.

  He wasn’t good about writing letters, he had warned her. She had cautioned herself not to expect too many. But since he was Sam she knew he would telegraph and even telephone at unexpected times. It wouldn’t surprise her, she thought, to get back to her room and find it filled with roses.

  It would be full of Sam anyway. Vassar would be full of him. Sam at Vassar! And all the chaperones in the world couldn’t keep him out.

  Carney began to laugh, and laughing she ran down the hill, through the spicy pine grove, through Matthew Vassar’s orchard, and over the brook to meet her junior year.

  Winona’s Pony Cart

  For

  STEPHEN and CATHY BOND,

  BONNIE CROWE,

  and

  LEA and ANN AVERY

  Contents

  1. Winona and Toodles

  2. Winona and Her Friends

  3. Party Invitations

  4. A Different Kind of Party Invitation

  5. Getting Ready for the Party

  6. A Surprise for Mrs. Root

  7. A Surprise for Winona

  8. Winona and Jingle

  1

  Winona and Toodles

  WINONA ROOT and her pug dog Toodles were sitting on the wall which hemmed in one side of the large Root lawn. Winona was cross.

  “Dignified! Dignified!” she was saying crossly. She kicked her heels against the white stones of the wall. It hurt, but she didn’t care.

  She was saying “dignified” because her mother had told her that she ought to be more so.

  Her mother had come out of doors a little while before to call Winona in, and had found her sitting on top of the bird bath. This marble bowl stood on a tall pedestal out on the front lawn. Winona had been calling, “Giddap! Giddap!” and bouncing up and down and slapping imaginary reins. She was pretending, of course, to be riding a pony.

  Naturally, she had gotten wet—her dress, her two petticoats, even her panties. There was water in a bird bath; wasn’t there? Was that her fault? If she had a pony she wouldn’t have to go riding on so many other things.

  But her mother hadn’t waited to hear these explanations. She had
been much annoyed, perhaps because she was entertaining the Ladies’ Foreign Missionary Society, and Winona was wearing her very best dress. She had been supposed to pass the candy around.

  “Well,” her mother had said slowly, “you can’t pass candy now.”

  “But I want to pass it!” Winona had wailed.

  “And you can’t have any refreshments.”

  “But I want some refreshments!” Winona had scrambled down from the bird bath, dripping and crying.

  Her mother had paid no attention. She spoke gently, as she always did, but her voice was as firm as a rock. “Go in the back door and up the back stairs. Change your clothes, and then take Toodles and sit out on the wall until my guests go home.”

  She picked up the skirt of her gray silk dress and started to go away. But she stopped and gave Winona a look. It was a sort of sad, discouraged look as though she was thinking, what on earth am I going to do with this child!

  “Winona,” she said, “you’re almost eight years old. You ought to be more dignified.”

  “Dignified!” Winona said now, as she sat on the wall with Toodles.

  Toodles was asleep. Winona knew he was asleep because his tail was uncurled. When Toodles was awake his tail curled up as tight as a doughnut on his smooth yellow hip. But when he was asleep it hung as straight as a sausage.

  Winona kept on kicking the wall. “This house is too dignified whatsoever,” she said.

  The house stood on a corner, catercorner to the school house. It was dignified, all right. It was a large brick house, painted white, with dark green shutters and porches on every side. The lawn was full of trees: tall oaks and elms and maples. The leaves were turning red and yellow and orange and brown and pink.

  “Getting ready for your birthday,” her father had told her at dinner. The trees were always brightly colored for Winona’s birthday because it came in October.