The Cricket Part 33

"Shut up, Isabelle; shut up!"

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

That supper proved to be a most difficult meal! Usually when there were guests, the girls talked and behaved very prettily, but on this occasion they sat like silent, accusing ghosts, eating in unbroken stillness.

Mrs. Benjamin tried to lead them into conversation, but in vain. There were cross currents of feeling which she could not understand or cope with. Isabelle babbled on, with intermittent fits of hysterical laughter. Whenever she spoke, black looks were concentrated upon her; when Wally spoke, they were transferred to him. Mr. and Mrs. Benjamin did their best, but they were relieved when the ordeal was over and the girls went off to the study room.

Isabelle was excused, because of her guest. She was glad of every moment that postponed her hour of reckoning. Wally could be disposed of, but the girls must be met. The Benjamins had duties to attend to, so Wally and his daughter were left alone for a quarter of an hour, in the library.

"Look here!" he burst out at her. "What's the matter with those kids?"

"Matter?"--innocently.

"They glared at me as if I had murdered their mothers! Do they always eat in dead silence like that?"

Isabelle cast a glance over her shoulders to see that they were quite alone.

"This is what I tried to save you from," she whispered.

"You mean that's why you bundled me off this morning, and barred me out this evening?"

She nodded solemnly.

"The machine balked, the tire blew out, I had to come back," he apologized. "What's the matter with 'em anyhow?"

"You see we have a society for the Discouragement of Visiting Parents."

"What's the point?"

"You see, we endure a great deal from our parents, at home, but here we are free. The minute they begin visiting us, the trouble begins. So when they come, we are pledged to act like this, and they never come again."

"Nice hospitable lot of kids! And do the Benjamins stand for this?"

"They don't know about it; it's a secret."

"They can see, can't they? A blind man could have seen their outrageous manners," he remarked, hotly.

"Parents have outrageous manners, too, you know, and we have to put up with them"--calmly.

"Well, I'm----"

"Don't swear, Wally; Quakers don't like it."

"I never heard such nerve in my life! Lot of kids setting themselves up----"

"Try to put yourself in our place, Wally. When you were at school, did you long to have your mother visit you?"

"That was different----"

"No, that was the same," she said, finally. "I tried to save you, but you would come back. I've enjoyed your visit very much, but it's against our rules to act kindly to visiting parents, and if I do I'll be expelled."

"I suppose you'd like me to leave to-night?"--sarcastically.

"No, but get off as soon as you can in the morning, and let me manage things to-night."

The Benjamins joined them at this point, so conversation became general.

Isabelle withdrew into her own mind, to think ahead how to avert the next crisis. When the girls came down for the hour of relaxation, there would be more embarra.s.sment, unless she could manage. She strolled to the window and looked out.

There was a brilliant full moon, showering its largesse over the hills.

They looked so calm, so remote--why did humans introduce such problems into the scheme of things? questioned Isabelle precociously. But the view gave her an idea.

"Mrs. Benjamin," she cried, "might we have a moonlight tramp and show my father some of our walks?"

"Would thy father like that? We often go for a walk in the moonlight, Mr. Bryce. The girls like it before they go to bed. Would thee enjoy it?"

Isabelle fixed him with a stern eye, and nodded.

"Why, yes, I think that would be nice," said Wally, who hated walking.

When the girls came down they silently accepted the plan. They put on their sweaters and boots, as the spring was young and the ground soft.

Mrs. Benjamin marvelled at their restraint, but laid it to their commendable desire to appear well before their guest. Two by two they marched dumbly behind the Benjamins and the Bryces. Up hill and down they went. Isabelle felt their eyes like javelins in her back, even while she kept up a lively stream of conversation.

"Girls, thee need not walk in line," protested Mrs. Benjamin. "Show thy father the sowing game, Isabelle. Lead the girls out. This is a game thy daughter invented, Mr. Bryce, and which we love to play."

Isabelle, thus adjured, stepped forth, swept the enemy with a glance and took command. It was really a sort of a dance, whirling and circling and sowing seed in pantomime. Usually it was a wild, laughing happy affair--with antics and pranks extemporaneously introduced--but to-night it was as forced and funereal as a chorus of grave diggers. Mr. Bryce murmured appreciation, Mrs. Benjamin looked her question to her husband, who shook his head.

After what seemed to Wally ages of torment and a hundred miles or so of action, they went back to the school and to bed. Reminded by Isabelle, he arranged for an early start, and then Wally's part in the episode was closed.

But Isabelle's troubles had just begun. Peggy was in bed when she entered their room, and Isabelle was sure she was awake although her face was toward the wall, and no answer to questions pa.s.sed her lips.

Isabelle hurried to put out the light, but when she was in bed, whispers seemed to surround her, fingers to point at her, out of the dark. She turned the situation over and over in her mind. She had spared Wally the truth, but she herself must face it. Unless she could think of a way to explain her fairy stories to the girls, her position as leader in that school was lost. She invented this explanation and that, only to discard them. It seemed as if only her death could solve the problem, and she felt that to be extreme, in the circ.u.mstances.

She turned and tossed and agonized for hours, to fall, finally, into a troubled sleep, beset by dreams of herself, as a sort of pariah, wandering through her school days, on the edge of things.

The next day brought no soothing surprise. Cold nods of good-morning greeted her, groups of whispering critics edged away from her contaminating presence. Even Peggy, the faithful, had gone over to the enemy. The nervous strain of the day told on her, and when she made a bad mistake in a recitation the cla.s.s t.i.ttered.

"Why, girls," said Mr. Benjamin in surprise, "it is not courteous to laugh at a mistake."

Evening brought Isabelle to a state of complete despair. The heavens had not opened to save her this time. She was to expiate in full. . . . Then she rose to new heights. She determined to make full confession and demand a public sentence. She would make herself suffer to the full extent.

True to instinct, even in despair, she waited until the girls had gathered for recreation hour before bedtime. Then she rose up, and as it were, laid her head upon the block.

"Mrs. Benjamin, I have to be punished," she said.

"Hast thou, Isabelle?"