CHAPTER VI
UNDER A CLOUD
The officer's injunction not to talk of the case of Colonel Weatherbywas of little avail in insuring secrecy. Oscar Dowd, who owned andedited the one weekly newspaper in town, which appeared under the titleof "The Beverly Beacon," was a very ferret for news. He had to be;otherwise there never would have been enough happenings in the vicinityto fill the scant columns of his little paper, which was printed in bigtype to make the items and editorials fill as much space as possible.
Uncle Eben met the editor and told him the Colonel had gone awaysuddenly and had vacated the Vandeventer mansion and put Mary Louisewith Miss Stearne to board. Thereat, Oscar Dowd scented "news" andcalled on Miss Stearne for further information. The good lady wasalmost as much afraid of an editor as of an officer of the law, sounder Oscar's rapid-fire questioning she disclosed more of the dreadfulcharge against Colonel Weatherby than she intended to. She evenadmitted the visit of the secret service agent, but declined to givedetails of it.
Oscar found the agent had departed for parts unknown--perhaps to trailthe escaped Colonel--but the hotel keeper furnished him with otherwisps of information and, bunching all the rumors together and siftingthe wheat from the chaff, the editor evolved a most thrilling tale toprint in the Wednesday paper. Some of the material his own imaginationsupplied; much else was obtained from irresponsible gossips who had nofoundation for their assertions. Miss Stearne was horrified to find, onreceiving her copy of the Wednesday "Beacon" that big headlines acrossthe front page announced: "Beverly Harbors a Criminal in Disguise!Flight of Colonel James Weatherby when a Federal Officer Seeks toArrest him for a Terrible Crime!"
Then followed a mangled report of the officer's visit to Beverly ongovernment business, his recognition of Colonel Weatherby--who was noneother than the noted criminal, James J. Hathaway--on the street infront of Cooper's Hotel, how the officer wired Washington forinstructions and how Hathaway, alias Weatherby, escaped in the dead ofnight and had so far successfully eluded all pursuit. What crimeHathaway, alias Weatherby, was accused of, the officer would notdivulge, and the statements of others disagreed. One report declaredthe Colonel had wrecked a New York bank and absconded with enormoussums he had embezzled; another stated he had been president of aswindling stock corporation which had used the mails illegally tofurther its nefarious schemes. A third account asserted he had insuredhis life for a million dollars in favor of his daughter, Mrs. Burrows,and then established a false death and reappeared after Mrs. Burrowshad collected the insurance money.
Having printed all this prominently in big type, the editor appended abrief note in small type saying he would not vouch for the truth of anystatement made in the foregoing article. Nevertheless, it was aterrible arraignment and greatly shocked the good citizens of Beverly.
Miss Stearne, realizing how humiliated Mary Louise would be if thenewspaper fell into her hands, carefully hid her copy away where noneof the girls could see it; but one of the day scholars brought a copyto the school Thursday morning and passed it around among the girls, sothat all were soon in possession of the whole scandalous screed.
Mable Westervelt, after feasting upon the awful accusations, cruellyhanded the paper to Mary Louise. The girl's face blanched and then grewred, her mouth fell open as if gasping for breath and her eyes staredwith a pained, hopeless expression at the printed page that branded herdearly loved Gran'pa Jim a swindler and a thief. She rose quickly andleft the room, to the great relief of the other girls, who wanted totalk the matter over.
"The idea," cried Mable indignantly, "of that old villain's foistinghis grandchild on this respectable school while he ran away to escapethe penalty of his crimes!"
"Mary Louise is all right," asserted Jennie Allen stoutly. "She isn'tto blame, at all."
"I warned you that her goody-goody airs were a cloak to hiddenwickedness," said Mable, tossing her head.
"Blood will tell," drawled Lina Darrow, a very fat girl. "Mary Louisehas bad blood in her veins and it's bound to crop out, sooner or later.I advise you girls to keep your trunks locked and to look after yourjewelry."
"Shame--shame!" cried Dorothy Knerr, and the others echoed thereproach. Even Mable looked at fat Lina disapprovingly.
However, in spite of staunch support on the part of her few realfriends, Mary Louise felt from that hour a changed atmosphere when inthe presence of her school fellows. Weeks rolled by without furtherpublic attacks upon Gran'pa Jim, but among the girls at the schoolsuspicion had crept in to ostracize Mary Louise from the generalconfidence. She lost her bright, cheery air of self-assurance and grewshy and fearful of reproach, avoiding her schoolmates more than theyavoided her. Instead of being content in her new home, as she had hopedto be, the girl found herself more miserable and discontented than atany other period of her life. She longed continually to be comforted byGran'pa Jim and Mamma Bee, and even lost interest in her studies,moping dismally in her room when she should have been taking aninterest in the life at the school.
Even good Miss Stearne had unconsciously changed in her attitude towardthe forlorn girl. Deciding one day that she needed some new shoes, MaryLouise went to the principal to ask for the money with which to buythem.
Miss Stearne considered the matter seriously. Then she said withwarning emphasis:
"My dear, I do not think it advisable for you to waste your funds onshoes, especially as those you have are in fairly good condition. Ofcourse, your grandfather left some money with me, to be expended as Isaw fit, but now that he has abscon--eh--eh--secreted himself, so tospeak, we can expect no further remittances. When this term is endedany extra money should be applied toward your further board andtuition. Otherwise you would become an outcast, with no place to go andno shelter for your head. That, in common decency, must be avoided. No;I do not approve of any useless expenditures. I shall hoard this moneyfor future emergencies."
In happier times Mary Louise would have been indignant at the thoughtthat her grandfather would ever leave her unprovided for, but she hadbeen so humbled of late that this aspect of her affairs, so candidlypresented by Miss Stearne, troubled her exceedingly. She had written aletter every week to her grandfather, addressing it, as he hadinstructed her to do, in care of Mr. Peter Conant at Dorfield. Andalways she had stolen out, unobserved, and mailed the letter at thevillage post office. Of course she had never by a single word referredto the scandal regarding the Colonel or her mother, or to her ownunhappy lot at school because of that scandal, knowing how such areport would grieve them; but the curious thing about thiscorrespondence was that it was distinctly one-sided. In the threemonths since they had gone away, Mary Louise had never received ananswer to any of her letters, either from her grandfather or her mother.
This might be explained, she reflected, by the fact that they suspectedthe mails would be watched; but this supposition attributed some truthto the accusation that Gran'pa Jim was a fugitive from justice, whichshe would not allow for an instant. Had he not told her to have faithin him, whatever happened? Should she prove disloyal just because abrutal officer and an irresponsible newspaper editor had branded herdear grandfather a criminal?
No! Whatever happened she would cling to her faith in the goodness ofdear Gran'pa Jim.
There was very little money in her purse; a few pennies that she musthoard to buy postage stamps with. Two parties for young people weregiven in Beverly and at both of them Mary Louise was the only girlboarding at the school who was uninvited. She knew that some of thegirls even resented her presence at the school and often when shejoined a group of schoolmates their hushed conversation warned her theyhad been discussing her.
Altogether, she felt that her presence at the school was fast becomingunbearable and when one of the boarders openly accused her of stealinga diamond ring--which was later discovered on a shelf above awashstand--the patient humility of Mary Louise turned to righteousanger and she resolved to leave the shelter of Miss Stearne's roofwithout delay.
There was only one possible
place for her to go--to the Conant house atDorfield, where her mother and grandfather were staying and where shehad already passed three of the most pleasant years of her short life.Gran'pa Jim had not told her she could come to him, even in anemergency, but when she explained all the suffering she had endured atthe school she knew quite well that he would forgive her for coming.
But she needed money for the long journey, and this must be secured insome way from her own resources. So she got together all the jewelryshe possessed and placing it in her handbag started for the town.
She had an idea that a jewelry shop was the proper place to sell herjewelry, but Mr. Trumbull the jeweler shook his head and said thatWatson, at the bank, often loaned money on such security. He advisedthe girl to see Watson.
So Mary Louise went to the "bank," which was a one-man affair situatedin the rear of the hardware store, where a grating had been placed inone corner. There she found Mr. Watson, who was more a country brokerthan a banker, and throve by lending money to farmers.
Gran'pa Jim was almost as fond of pretty jewels as he was of goodclothes and he had always been generous in presenting hisgrand-daughter with trinkets on her birthdays and at Christmas time.The jewelry she laid before Mr. Watson was really valuable and thebanker's eye was especially attracted by a brooch of pearls that musthave cost several hundred dollars.
"How much do you want to borrow on this lot?" he asked.
"As much as I can get, sir," she replied.
"Have you any idea of redeeming it?"
"I hope to do so, of course."
The banker knew perfectly well who Mary Louise was and suspected sheneeded money.
"This is no pawnbroker's shop," he asserted. "I'll give you a hundreddollars, outright, for this pearl brooch--as a purchase,understand--but the rest of the junk I don't want."
A little man who had entered the hardware store to purchase a tindipper was getting so close to the "bank" that Mary Louise feared beingoverheard; so she did not argue with Mr. Watson. Deciding that ahundred dollars ought to take her to Dorfield, she promptly acceptedthe offer, signed a bill of sale and received her money. Then shewalked two miles to the railway station and discovered that a ticket toDorfield could be bought for ninety-two dollars. That would give hereight dollars leeway, which seemed quite sufficient. Elated at theprospect of freedom she returned to the school to make her preparationfor departure and arrived just in time to join the other girls atdinner.