Under this motley ceiling the room showed plainly it was the living-room of the house. There was a large cooking-stove that shone so you might have seen your face in it, a row of wash-tubs, leaning bottom side up against the wall, two wooden pails and three tin ones, standing on a shelf over the tubs, and these in close proximity to the only window in the room. Just before this window was a small table with a Bible, a well-worn one, on it, and a pair of steel-bowed spectacles. One yellow wooden chair, and what was called "a settle"

near the stove, a large cooking-table, and one more chair, made the furniture of the room.

Before this table sat an old woman, dressed in a black petticoat, and a red, short gown that came a little below her waist. She wore a cap that fitted close to her head, made of some black cloth, innocent of bow or frill; from under it, locks of gray hung down about her face and neck. She had a swarthy skin, two small eyes, hidden by a large pair of gla.s.ses, a mouth that kept in motion in spite of the necessity of stillness which a tableau is supposed to demand, as if she were reading the letter she held in her hand aloud. The laugh and clapping which this scene called forth had hardly subsided when, from behind a hidden corner of the stage, a sweet, clear voice began to read the descriptive poem.

"It's Kate Underwood herself," was whispered from seat to seat.

"There's no other girl in school that can read as well as she can."

The poem gave a brief description of the kitchen as it appeared on the stage, then a more lengthy one of the old woman, with the contents of the letter she was reading. It was from a niece at a boarding-school, who proposed, in a brief and direct way, to visit this aunt during her coming vacation. The tableau was acted so well, and with such piquancy, that claps and peals of laughter from the audience, and finally calls for "Kate Underwood," who demurely makes her appearance from behind the curtain, drops a stage courtesy, and disappears. The poem had been (this audience const.i.tuting the judges) excellent, the very best thing Kate ever wrote; and as for the tableaux, were there ever any before one-half so good?

Now, while to almost all in the hall there had been nothing said or done that could injure the feelings of any one, to Marion Parke it seemed an unkind take-off of her cousin during his recent visit to her.

Something in the tall, gaunt girl, in her rough, coa.r.s.e dress, in the grotesque awkwardness of her movements, reminded Marion of Cousin Abijah; and while she had laughed with the others, and had refused to allow her feelings to be hurt, she left the hall uncomfortable and unhappy, wishing he had never come, or that all the school had shown the kind consideration of Miss Ashton; nor was she helped in the least when she heard Susan telling in great glee how the whole plan had come to them after the visit of that uncouth old cousin of Marion Parke.

CHAPTER XIII.

GLADYS LEAVES THE CLUB.

Dorothy was the first to see Marion at the door of their room after the tableaux. She hoped she had not heard what Sue had said, but that she had she could not doubt when she saw the pained expression on Marion's face. In the after discussion of the entertainment, Marion took no part, but went quietly to her bed, with only a brief "good-night."

"They have hurt her feelings, and they ought to have been ashamed of themselves," said kind Dorothy to the two members of the club sitting beside her. "Girls, if that is what you mean to do in your Demosthenic Club, I am most thankful I never joined it, and the sooner you both leave it the better."

"Grandmarm!" said Sue, her hot temper flashing into her face, "when we want your advice, we will ask it."

"What's up, Dody? Whose feelings are hurt, and who ought to be ashamed of themselves?" asked Gladys. "I don't know what you are talking about."

"About Marion and the Demosthenic Club!" answered Dorothy briefly.

"What for? What has Marion to do with the club?"

Dorothy looked straight into Gladys's face for a moment. Whatever other faults Gladys had, she had never, even in trifles, been otherwise than honest and straightforward. There was nothing in her face now but surprise; so Dorothy, much relieved that she was not a partaker in the unkindness, explained to her that, as Susan had just told them, the club had taken Marion's country cousin for a b.u.t.t, and had made him, with the old aunt,--the knowledge of whom must have come to them from some one in their room,--the characters in the farce; and that Marion, coming into the room just as Susan was telling of it, had heard her; and it had hurt her feelings.

Now, strange as it may seem, it was nevertheless true that the club, knowing Gladys well, and how impossible it would be for her to do anything that might injure another, had carefully kept from her any direct partic.i.p.ation in it. She knew in a general way what was to be done, but was ignorant of particulars.

No sooner had the whole been made known to her, than without a word, though it was after the time when the girls were allowed to leave their rooms, without the slightest effort to move softly, she pa.s.sed the doors of several teachers, up into another corridor, not stopping until she tapped at Jenny Barton's room.

The tap was followed by the m.u.f.fled sound of scurrying feet, of a table pulled hastily away, of whispers intended to be soft, but in the hurry having a strangely sibilant tone, that made them almost words spoken aloud, to the impatient Gladys.

She rapped a second time, a little louder than the first, and the door was opened by Jenny, in her nightdress. The gas in the room was out, and there was no one to be seen.

"Why, Gladys Philbrick!" she exclaimed crossly, pulling Gladys hastily in; "you frightened us almost out of our wits. Girls! it's only Gladys!"

Out from under the beds and from the closets in the two bedrooms crept one after another the girls of the club. All were there but Susan and Gladys; and they would have been invited, but it was well known that if Gladys broke a rule of the school, she never rested until she had made full confession to one of the teachers. She was not to be trusted in the least; and, of course, Susan could not be invited without her, so the knowledge of the spread which was to succeed the tableaux had been carefully kept from them. No wonder at Jenny's reception of her!

Somewhat staggered by this, and by the appearance of the hidden, laughing girls, Gladys stood for a moment staring blankly around her, then she asked, singling Kate Underwood out from among the others,--

"Kate! did you write that poem to make fun of Marion Parke's country cousin?"

"Why do you ask?" answered Kate, turning brusquely upon Gladys.

"Because, if you did, and if, as Sue says, you got up those tableaux to make fun of him, I think you are the meanest girl in the school; and as for the club--a club that would do such a thing, I wouldn't be a member of a moment longer, not if you would give me a million dollars!"

"Well, as we have no million to give you, and wouldn't part with even a copper to have you stay, you can have your name taken off the roll any time," said the president majestically.

"All right, it's done then; but my question is not answered. Kate Underwood, did, or did you not, intend to make fun of Marion Parke's cousin?"

"When I know by what right you ask me, I will answer you; until then, Gladys Philbrick, will you be kind enough to speak in a lower voice, unless you wish to bring some of the teachers down upon us, or perhaps you will report us to Miss Ashton; I think she has just come in the late train, I heard a carriage stop at the door."

"You want to know my right?" answered Gladys, without taking any notice of Kate's taunts. "It's the right of being ashamed to hold a girl up to ridicule for what she couldn't help, and a girl like Marion Parke. I hoped you could say you didn't mean to; but I see you can't."

Then Gladys, without another word, left the room, leaving behind her a set of girls who, to say the least, were not in a mood to congratulate themselves on the events of the evening.

The spread was hastily put on the table again, but it was eaten by them with sober faces and troubled hearts.

"Well," said Sue, as Gladys came noisily into their room, "now I suppose you've made all the girls so mad they will never speak to me again."

"I have told them what I think of them," and Gladys looked at Sue askance over her shoulder as she spoke, "and I advise you to quit a club that can be as unkind as this has been to-night."

"When I want your advice I will ask it; I advise you to keep it until then. Whom did you see?"

"All of them, hiding under beds and in closets."

"That means a spread without leave, and we not invited. You're a tell-tale Gladys; they are afraid of you."

"Good!" said Gladys with a scornful laugh.

"Girls," said a gentle voice from the bedroom door, "don't mind; it's foolish in me I dare say, and--and the tableaux were real funny," and an odd attempt at a laugh ended in a burst of tears.

In a moment both of Gladys's arms were around Marion's neck.

"You dear, darling old Marion," she said, whimpering herself.

"Too much noise in this room!" said Miss Palmer's voice at their door.

"I did not expect this, Marion! Dorothy, what does it mean?"

"We are going to bed, Miss Palmer," said Dorothy, opening the door immediately. "It was about the tableaux we were talking."

"You should have been in bed half an hour ago; I am sorry to be obliged to report you. Let this never happen again. Your room has been in most respects a model room until now."

Not a girl spoke, and if Miss Palmer had come again fifteen minutes later, she would have found the gas out and the girls in bed.

CHAPTER XIV.