Part 8 (1/2)
Miss Bancroft accepted his hand and pressed it affectionately.
”Well, then, good-bye. No, don't bother to open the door for me; I'll go this way.”
He smiled at her again as she went down the steps.
”I always feel lonely when you have gone, even when we have been quarrelling,” he remarked, with a wistful look.
”Of course you feel lonely. You roll around in that huge house of yours like a hazelnut in a shoe,” returned Miss Bancroft, quickly. He caught her meaning, and as quickly replied:
”Nonsense--I like plenty of room. Never could bear to have a lot of people hanging around. No man can accomplish anything with an army of women and things hanging to his coat-tails!”
”Tst!” observed Miss Bancroft, and because there was no answer to that, she could retire with the satisfaction of having had the last word.
CHAPTER VII
A MAN OF ”PRINCIPLES”
”One dozen stockings--six woolen and six silk--imagine owning six pairs of silk stockings---six nighties--don't they look luxurious, all beribboned and fluffy? One thick sweater, one pair of stout boots--I hope these boots are stout enough; they look as if they could kick a hole through the side of a battle-s.h.i.+p. One mackintosh--now where under the sun can I put this mackintosh?”
”Oh, just roll it up in a bundle and slam it in that corner near your shoes. It'll keep 'em from b.u.mping around. My dear, you look as if you'd been in a tornado.”
”_In_ a tornado! I _am_ a tornado.” Nancy lifted a flushed face, and gazed at Alma through a haze of tumbled hair. Then she sat back on her heels in front of the open trunk, and seizing her locks near the temples, pulled them frenziedly. ”Alma Prescott, if you sit there another moment looking calm, I'll throw this shoe-horn at you. Do anything, scream, run around in circles, pant, anything, but _don't_ look calm. Every minute I'm forgetting something vital. Let me see, nail-brush, tooth-brush, cold-cream----”
”If you go over that formula again, I'll be a mopping, mowing idiot,”
observed Alma serenely, from the window-seat. ”I wonder how one mops and mows--it sounds awfully idiotic, doesn't it? I saw you put the nail-brush _and_ the tooth-brush _and_ the cold-cream in the tray there--left-hand corner. Now, for goodness' sake, forget about them--it's just little things like that that unhinge the greatest minds. You're horribly bad company while you're packing a trunk.”
”Well, anyhow, it's nearly done now--and yours is ready.”
”You're a lamb for doing mine for me--I haven't been a bit of help, I know. Oh, you _know_ it's going to be glorious fun--at boarding school. I've always longed to go to boarding school. And it isn't awfully strict at Miss Leland's, Elise Porterbridge says. They have midnight feasts, and all sorts of things--and then, you know, Frank Barrows is at Harvard, and he asked me up there for some dance near Christmas. Don't you think Frank is very nice, Nancy?” This was what Alma had been leading around to, and Nancy knew it. Personally she thought Frank rather an affected youth, but she had sense enough not to air this opinion before Alma just then.
”Why, yes, he seems very nice,” she replied, with very mild interest.
”I think he has sort of more to him than most men of his age,” pursued Alma, affecting a judicial air.
”Probably he has.”
”He dances beautifully. Goodness, I had a wonderful time the other night. I know that you probably think it's wrong of me, but I'd like nothing more than to go to a party like that every night in the week.”
”_I_ don't think it's wrong at all--only I think you'd probably get awfully sick of it in a little while. And--and the chief trouble as far as we are concerned is that it's so dreadfully expensive. I know you think I'm always harping on the same string--but do you remember the motto of Mr. Micawber--'Income one pound--expenditure nineteen s.h.i.+llings and sixpence--product, happiness; income one pound, expenditure one pound and sixpence, product, misery----'”
”Well, I know that's very sensible, but there's lots of sense to 'eat, drink, and be merry, for to-morrow we die,'” returned Alma, with a gay laugh. ”You're thinking about my dress and slippers--I could have killed that person who spilt their fruit punch all over my skirt, but there was nothing to do about it, and besides I'm sure I can hide the stain with a sash or something. I don't believe in worrying.” With this, Madame Optimist turned and, pressing her short nose against the window pane, drummed with her little pink nails against the wet gla.s.s.
The rain was falling again in a monotonous drenching downpour, stripping the trees of the few, brown, s.h.i.+vering leaves that clung to the dripping branches. The promise of Indian summer seemed to have been definitely broken for reasons of Dame Nature's own, and the weather was having a tantrum about it. But inside, the little bedroom was all the cosier in contrast to the woebegone gloom of the early dusk. The chintz window curtains of Nancy's making were faded by many was.h.i.+ngs, it is true, and the two white iron bedsteads might have looked sprucer for a coat of paint, but with a fire glowing in the grate, and sending out an almost affectionate glint upon all the familiar objects, the little room had an air of motherly cheerfulness and comfort. A shabby but inviting armchair stood in front of the hearth. In a corner, a white bookcase harbored a family of well-worn volumes, ranging from ”Grimm's Fairy Tales,” and ”Stepping Stones to English Literature” to ”The Three Musketeers” and ”Jane Eyre,” all tattered and thumbed, and seeming to wear the happy, weary expression of a rag doll that has been ”loved to death.”
”Well,” Nancy was saying, in reply to Alma's observation, ”I don't believe in worrying, but I do believe in having an umbrella if you live in a rainy climate. Then you don't have to worry about the--rain.
_Comprenez-vous_?”
”I comprenez--you are talking in symbols, aren't you? Where's Mother?”
”Here I am, darling,” replied Mrs. Prescott from the doorway. ”Dear me, the trunks are all packed, aren't they? Nancy, what a wonderful child you are. Oh, whatever am I going to do without my daughters!”