"You can have a lock-if you want to."

She glanced up, and then quickly down. And she felt herself blushing again; she didn't exactly like to blush--yet--yet--

"Do I want it?"

Already Raymond had dropped his improvised fan and was fumbling for his knife.

"Where?" he asked.

Missy shivered deliciously at the imminence of that bright steel blade; what if he should let it slip?--but, just then, even mutilation, provided it be at Raymond's hand, didn't seem too terrible.

"Wherever you want," she murmured.

"All right--I'll take a snip here where it twines round your ear--it looks so sort of affectionate."

She giggled with him. Of course it was all terribly silly--and yet--

Then there followed a palpitant moment while she held her breath and shut her eyes. A derisive shout caused her to open them quickly. There stood Don Jones, grinning.

"Missy gave Raymond a lock of her hair! Missy gave Raymond a lock of her hair!"

Missy's face grew hot; blushing was not now a pleasure; she looked up, then down; she didn't know where to look.

"Gimme one, too! You got to play fair, Missy--gimme one, too!"

Then, in that confusion of spirit, she heard her voice, which didn't seem to be her own voice but a stranger's, saying:

"All right, you can have one, too, if you want it, Don."

Don forthwith advanced. Missy couldn't forebear a timid glance toward Raymond. Raymond was not looking pleased. She wished she might a.s.sure him she didn't really want to give the lock to Don, and yet, at the same time, she felt strangely thrilled at that lowering look on Raymond's face. It was curious. She wanted Raymond to be happy, yet she didn't mind his being just a little bit unhappy--this way. Oh, how complicated and fascinating life can be!

During the remainder of their stay at the ford Missy was preoccupied with this new revelation of herself and with a furtive study of Raymond whose continued sulkiness was the cause of it. Raymond didn't once come to her side during all that endless three-mile tramp back to Cherryvale; but she was conscious of his eye on her as she trudged along beside Don Jones. She didn't feel like talking to Don Jones. Nor was the rest of the crowd, now, a lively band; it was harder to laugh than it had been in the morning; harder even to talk. And when they did talk, little unsuspected irritabilities began to gleam out. For now, when weary feet must somehow cover those three miles, thoughts of the journey's end began to rise up in the truants' minds. During the exalted moments of adventure they hadn't thought of consequences. That's a characteristic of exalted moments. But now, so to speak, the ball was over, the roses all shattered and faded, and the weary dancers must face the aftermath of to-morrow...

And Missy, trudging along the dusty road beside Don Jones who didn't count, felt all kinds of shadows rising up to eclipse brightness in her soul. What would Professor Sutton do?--he was fearfully strict. And father and mother would never understand...

If only Don Jones would stop babbling to her! Why did he persist in walking beside her, anyway? That lock of hair didn't mean anything!

She wished she hadn't given it to him; why had she, anyway? She herself couldn't comprehend why, and Raymond would never, never comprehend.

The farther she walked, the less she saw the pleasanter aspects of Raymond's jealousy and the more what might be the outcome of it. Perhaps he'd never have anything to do with her again. That would be terrible!

And she'd have such a short time to try making it up. For in less than a month she'd have to go with Aunt Isabel to Colorado; and, then, she wouldn't see Raymond for weeks and weeks. Colorado! It was like talking of going to the moon, a dreary, dead, far-off moon, with no one in it to speak to. Aunt Isabel? Aunt Isabel was sweet, but she was so old--nearly thirty! How could she, Missy, go and leave Raymond misunderstanding her so?

But who can tell how Fate may work to confound rewards and punishments!

It was to become a legend in the Cherryvale High School how, once on a day in May, a daring band ran away from cla.s.ses and how the truant cla.s.s, in toto, was suspended for the two closing weeks of the semester, with no privilege of "making up" the grades. And the legend runs that one girl, and the most prominent girl in the cla.s.s at that, by reason of this sentence fell just below the minimum grade required to "pa.s.s."

Yes; Missy failed again. Of course that was very bad. And taking her disgrace home--indeed, that was horrid. As she faced homeward she felt so heavy inside that she knew she could never eat her dinner. Besides, she was walking alone--Raymond hadn't walked home with her since the wretched picnic. She sighed a sigh that was not connected with the grade card in her pocket. For one trouble dwarfs another in this world; and friendship is more than honours--a sacred thing, friendship! Only Raymond was so unreasonable over Don's lock of hair; yet, for all the painfulness of Raymond's crossness, Missy smiled the littlest kind of a down-eyed, secret sort of smile as she thought of it... It was so wonderful and foolish and interesting how much he cared that Missy began to question what he'd do if she got Don to give her a lock of his hair.

Then she sobered suddenly, as you do at a funeral after you have forgotten where you are and then remember. That card was an unpleasant thing to take home!... Just what did Raymond mean by giving Kitty Allen a lock of his hair? And doing it before Missy herself--"Kitty, here's that lock I promised you"--just like that. Then he had laughed and joked as if nothing unusual had happened--only was he watching her out of the corner of his eye when he thought she wasn't looking? That was the real question. The idea of Raymond trying to make her jealous! How simple-minded boys are!

But, after all, what a dear, true friend he had proved himself in the past--before she offended him. And how much more is friendship than mere pleasures like travel--like going to Colorado.

But was he jealous? If he was--Missy felt an inexplicable kind of bubbling in her heart at that idea. But if he wasn't--well, of course it was natural she should wonder whether Raymond looked on friendship as a light, come-and-go thing, and on locks of hair as meaning nothing at all. For he had never been intimate with Kitty Allen; and he had said he didn't like curly hair. Yet, probably, he had one of Kitty Allen's ringlets... Missy felt a new, hideous weight pulling down her heart.

Of course she had given that straight wisp to Don Jones--but what else could she do to keep him from telling? Oh, life is a muddle! And here, in less than a week, Aunt Isabel would come by and whisk her off to the ends of the earth; and she might have to go without really knowing what Raymond meant...

And oh, yes--that old card! How dreary life can be as one grows older.

Missy waited to show the card till her father came home to supper--she knew it was terribly hard for father to be stern. But when Missy, all mute appeal, extended him the report, he looked it over in silence and then pa.s.sed it on to mother. Mother, too, examined it with maddening care.

"Well," she commented at last. "I see you've failed again."

"It was all the fault of those two weeks' grades," the culprit tried to explain. "If it hadn't been for that--"

"But there was 'that.'" Mother's tone was terribly unsympathetic.

"I didn't think of grades--then."

"No, that's the trouble. I've warned you, Missy. You've got to learn to think. You'll have to stay home and make up those grades this summer. You'd better write to Aunt Isabel at once, so she won't be inconvenienced."

Mother's voice had the quiet ring of doom.

Tender-hearted father looked away, out the window, so as not to see the disappointment on his daughter's face. But Missy was gazing down her nose to hide eyes that were shining. Soon she made an excuse to get away.

Out in the summerhouse it was celestially beautiful and peaceful. And, magically, all this peace and beauty seemed to penetrate into her and become a part of herself. The glory of the pinkish-mauve sunset stole in and delicately tinged her so; the scent of the budding ramblers, and of the freshly-mowed lawn, became her own fragrant odour; the soft song of the breeze rocking the leaves became her own soul's lullaby. Oh, it was a heavenly world, and the future bloomed with enchantments! She could stay in Cherryvale this summer! Dear Cherryvale! Green prairies were so much nicer than snow-covered mountains, and gently sloping hills than sharp-pointing peaks; and much, much nicer than tempestuous waterfalls was the sweet placidity of Swan Creek. Dear Swan Creek...

The idea of Raymond's trying to make her jealous! How simple-minded boys are! But what a dear, true friend he was, and how much more is friendship than mere pleasures like travel--or prominence or fine grades or anything...

It was at this point in her cogitations that Missy, seeing her Anthology--an intimate poetic companion--where she'd left it on a bench, dreamily picked it up, turned a few pages, and then was moved to write.

We have borrowed her product to head this story.

Meanwhile, back in the house, her father might have been heard commenting on the n.o.ble behaviour of his daughter.

"Didn't let out a single whimper--brave little thing! We must see to it that she has a good time at home--poor young one! I think we'd better get the car this summer, after all."

CHAPTER IX. DOBSON SAVES THE DAY

It was two years after the Spanish war; and she was seventeen years old and about to graduate.

On the Senior cla.s.s roster of the Cherryvale High School she was catalogued as Melissa Merriam, well down--in scholarship's token--toward the tail-end of twenty-odd other names. To the teachers the list meant only the last young folks added to a backreaching line of girls and boys who for years and years had been coming to "Commencement" with "credits"

few or many, large expectant eyes fixed on the future, and highly uncertain habits of behaviour; but, to the twenty-odd, such dead prosiness about themselves would have been inconceivable even in teachers.

And Missy?