Chapter XIV: Dramatics

THE mid-year examinations over, there was less strain upon the girls in all the classes, and the juniors began to think of the dramatics which they had planned to give the freshmen. Janet was cast for a prominent part requiring gorgeous costuming, and Polly was delighted. Lee Penrose as a saucy soubrette and Cordelia as leading lady were immensely interested. Girls, with suggestive-looking papers in their hands, were seen at odd times, pacing corridors or haunting corners, their lips moving silently and a far-away look in their eyes.

The sophomores had expressed their determination of being present and the juniors were equally determined that they should not get in.

"I am equal to charging upon them with a truncheon, whatever that is," said Lee. "Imagine looking up at a telling moment and seeing Jessie Turner grinning at you. No, girls, we must move heaven and earth to keep them out."

"Fancy trying to keep your mind on the variety of manly attitudes you must assume and battle with sophomores at the same time," said Grace Breitner who was cast for the part of the heroine's lover. "I'll never be able to make love to you properly, Cordelia, if I must fill my head with a dread of sophs. It's all I can do to stride and frown and cry, 'Hold sirrah,' as I should."

"Well, we won't call upon you, Grace," Lee assured her. "We, of the gentler sex, will protect ourselves. They'll not get in by the stage door, that's one thing certain."

"They'll not get in at all," declared Cordelia emphatically. "Where's Alphonso's doublet, Lee? I put it in this window box and it isn't here."

"Oh, I took it out," Lee told her. "I wanted to put in the fairy's dress, and the doublet crushed it, so I hung it up in my closet with the cap and the old monk's costume."

"You will call him a monk," protested Cordelia. "He is a minstrel."

"Well, he looks like a monk, or rather she looks like a monkess in that cloak."

"More like a monkey," put in Pen Robbins to whose lot it fell to play the part of minstrel. "I know I shall forget to sing the half of those lines extolling Alphonso's doughty deeds, as it is, and if I catch a sight of a single soph, I know I shall be a goner."

"Oh, you masculines make me tired," said Lee. "You haven't any of you the spirit of a canary bird, from the king down to the page who says, 'the knight is without.'"

"I always thought that was a silly speech," said Janet. "At eight o'clock, of course the night is without, and within, too, for that matter. I should say: 'Sir Belidor is without.'"

"I've learned it the other way," complained Nettie Slingluff, "and I'll have to say it so. I'd be sure to forget at the last minute if you mix me up."

"Nettie has three whole speeches to make," said Lee chidingly. "You forget that, Janet, and the shortest of them is not less than three words in length. I am surprised that you should want to burden her over-taxed brain with any alterations at this late moment."

Nettie pouted, but maintained that it was all very well for those girls who were to wear costumes familiar to them, but if they had on clothes which made them feel that they were not acquainted with themselves, perhaps they would not be so ready to make fun. "If I had to be a girl, I shouldn't be afraid," she declared.

"Well, take my part, I'm willing," said Lee.

But Nettie said it was too late, and every one laughed, for only Lee could do justice to the character which had been especially created for her.

Janet, as the beautiful princess, looked regal, Teddy declared, when she donned her trailing robes and appeared at Cordelia's door to display herself. "Is this ermine all right?" she asked. "I had to dab on those black splashes in such a hurry, that I'm afraid they are not very even."

"Oh, they'll do," said Cordelia, looking her over critically. "It looks very erminish, Janet; no one would suspect it to be canton-flannel and black paint. That train is stunning. You extravagant creature to buy all that velvet stuff!"

"It is only velveteen," said Janet. "I bought it 'on a bargain,' as Dicky says, and I can use it next winter for a gown if I want to; that is why I chose blue. Wasn't Miss Thurston dear to lend me this gorgeous brocade skirt and the bodice and all these jewelly things? Polly told her what I lacked and she offered these."

"It was good of her, and you are dazzling," said Lee. "I declare, Janet, you will outshine us all. But then you ought, being a princess. The king will have reason to be proud of his daughter. He has a beautiful canton-flannel robe made from his red portières, and he spent half the night in gilding his crown and sceptre. By the way, Janet, send over your fur rug in the morning; we shall want all the rugs we can get for the dais and the throne. Cordelia has thought of some fine local hits. She evolved them in bed this morning, and the minstrel is going to get them off. I wish you could see his lute. Isn't it fine to have some one in the class who can sing as well as Pen does?"

"I do hope it will all turn out well," said Janet. "I am getting a trifle anxious about my part."

"Oh, you needn't worry," Lee assured her; "you are all right, and I don't believe I shall have stage fright, but if Grace gets to laughing and forgets her stride, or if Nettie should happen to get her words hind part before, it would be fatal. I really think we should have given Nettie something easier," Lee added teasingly. "It would simply stop the whole performance if she were to announce 'without is the knight,' instead of 'the knight is without,' or if she should say: 'Your Majesty, a minstrel begs admittance, instead of a minstrel craves entrance, Your Majesty.' It actually makes my heart stand still when I think of such a catastrophe as that."

"Oh, do stop your teasing, Lee," said Cordelia. "I have my doubts about the wearing quality of this stuff; it is so thin it looks to me as if it might give out at a critical moment."

"Stay it with something strong around the armholes," suggested Janet, "that will make it all right. Gracious, there comes Mrs. Satterthwaite and Rosalie; I shall have to run." And gathering up her long train, she flew from the room.

A few days later, all was ready for the performance. It was to take place in the central hall of the main college building. This hall was open to the roof with galleries around the second and third floors overlooking the hall below. Upon the third floor were the studios for the use of the art classes, and on the second were various lecture rooms. The studios were usually vacated after two o'clock, but were open in case a student might elect to work there upon any special drawing.

On the afternoon of the day when the dramatics were to take place, a sophomore entered the building casually, and sauntered up to the studios by way of the stairway outside the large hall. In a little while, a second sophomore appeared and wended her way up-stairs. She carried a canvas in her hand and no one thought it anything unusual to see her there. Later on, the dress rehearsal took place, and the big hall was the scene of "confusion and creature complaint" as Lee said.

When all had assembled, Cordelia locked the outside door, and laid the key confidently upon the dais where the king was already enthroned.

"There," she exclaimed. "I'd like to see any one get in now."

The rehearsal went on till nearly dark. Then the girls filed out, Cordelia remaining till the last. When the door closed after the entire company, she called the janitor.

"Whiting," she said, "here are the keys. There is not a soul in this building but ourselves. Be sure that you lock the door after me. It is not to be opened again till it is time to admit the audience. We will come in by the basement, so be on hand to let us in by half-past six. No one is to be admitted at the front door till half-past seven, and then only those who have tickets. Remember this. The performers will all come in a body, so you will know that any one pretending to have a right here after we come, has to be sent away. Not another soul is to come in by the basement, mind."

Whiting grinned and promised to have a sharp eye for intruders.

Meantime the studios were occupied by a body of whispering, giggling girls, who, one by one, had quietly stolen up-stairs, unnoticed, each one bearing an innocent-looking color-box or roll of drawing paper. At six o'clock, each drew forth from one of these receptacles a substantial lunch which was eaten with a relish, and with the satisfied feeling which always follows a deed well done. There was absolute silence in the hall below, and save for the footsteps of Whiting as he went around lighting up, there appeared to be no sound in the building until the fifteen girls trooped up the basement stairs and with bustling excitement crossed over to the green-room.

Cordelia was triumphant. They had outwitted the sophs, she declared, and by their vigilance, the juniors had prevented the threatened intrusion.

At eight o'clock all was ready. Nettie Slingluff was declaring that she had a nervous chill. The king was expostulating with Alphonso because the latter insisted upon turning the royal robes upon their wrong side. Janet was jingling her chains and jeweled girdles as she swept up and down the room. The minstrel was wildly searching for his lute, and Lee was dancing a break-down in one corner in her joy at having circumvented the sophs.

"Almost everybody must have come," said Janet, looking through a peep-hole in the curtain. "There are quantities of the freshmen in their seats and almost all the seniors are there. Shall we ring up?"

"Ring up," returned Cordelia laconically.

Up went the curtain, and the play began. It so happened that the entire company appeared at once, just after the beginning of the first act. As the last one made her entrance, from the upper gallery came a blast of horns. The performers stopped short, aghast at the interruption. Every eye was directed toward the gallery where in smiling array appeared the whole sophomore class, each girl innocently sucking at a lemon stick imbedded in a lemon.

A perfect shout of laughter went up from the audience, and the disconcerted juniors were, for a moment, too confounded to go on. But Janet was the first to gather her self-possession. She whispered something to the minstrel who went forward and began a plaintive ballad which quieted the audience and gave the players a chance to recover themselves, then the performance went on successfully to the end. Yet though there was rage in the hearts of the players, they went through their parts with more spirit because of it, and evoked much applause especially from the uninvited guests who added to the general clapping of hands, many blasts upon their horns. They attempted no other disturbance, and behaved with the utmost propriety throughout.

"How did they get in? How did they?" cried Cordelia when the curtain had fallen on the last act, and the performers, warm and tired, sank into various attitudes about the green-room. "Could they have bribed Whiting?" she asked.

"Oh, no, they never would do that," said Janet; "they wouldn't dare, and he wouldn't take a bribe, for he might know it was as much as his place was worth. I have been puzzling over it the whole evening, and I believe I have solved the mystery. I saw a girl coming over here with her color-box just as I came in this afternoon. If one why not two or three, or a dozen, or the whole class? Did any one think to look in the studios before we began the rehearsal?"

"No, of course not," groaned Cordelia. "Idiots that we were! We should have examined every nook and corner of this edifice before we left it. All our precautions were taken to prevent their getting in at the time of the performance, whereas they had sense enough to get in before."

At the door, the departing players encountered a body of sophs drawn up in line, who blew a mighty blast upon their horns, gave their class yell and then dispersed, leaving the disgusted juniors to admit that they had been fairly worsted.

Polly was waiting outside for Janet, to precipitate herself upon her friend and congratulate her with much effusiveness. "You were the loveliest of them all," she declared, "a perfect princess of princesses. Every one of the girls said you were fine. Did you get my violets? I told Mr. Austin when he gave them to me, that I should send them to you, and he said they were mine to do with as I chose. Who sent you the lovely red roses, and oh, Janet, those dear little snowdrops, where did they come from?"

Janet with her arms full of her trophies, gave the roses into Polly's keeping. "Ted sent me those," she said, "but the curious thing is that I haven't an idea who sent the snowdrops. It would almost seem as if there must be some association connected with them, but I have racked my brain and cannot imagine who would select an unusual flower for the sake of a sentiment. There was no card with them."

"Some admirer who adores at a distance," said Polly. "It is a modest little bunch but very suggestive."

"Of what? Of snow, or innocence or springtime?"

"Let me think. Of all three, maybe. He or she saw you in a snow-storm. You are innocent of any knowledge of the passion you have aroused, and he or she hopes to meet you in the spring, yet as that is fairly here, perhaps spring merely suggests hope."

Janet laughed. "Very ingenious, Miss Polly Perkins. I haven't thanked you for your violets; they are very sweet and you are very sweet to give them up to me. Will you help me carry home these valuables? They must be returned to Miss Thurston to-morrow."

Polly willingly helped to transport the costumes and ornaments which Janet wished to keep under her own care, and left her friend at the door of Hopper Hall, returning to her own home with a party of other freshmen who were going that way.

Janet deposited her burdens on the bed, stuck the roses in a pitcher, the violets in a tumbler, but the snowdrops were given a place of honor in a fine Satsuma vase. Janet was standing before them with a contemplative look upon her face when Teddy came in.

"What are you adoring, princess?" she said.

"I'm not adoring, I am only wondering. Your roses were gorgeous, Ted. It was lovely of you to send them. Polly sent me violets, and some unknown has sent these snowdrops. Have you any idea who it could be?"

"Not the slightest," said Teddy. "No doubt some dear sentimental freshmen who has probably fallen in love with you, and worships at a distance as the manner of freshmen is."

"That is the most reasonable solution," said Janet, but she kept to herself the fact that it was not altogether a satisfactory one to her, and was better pleased to believe it was from some other than a freshman.