CHAPTER III
APPROACHING THE PROMISED LAND
Tom had tried to remove the smut of the steamboat engine-room from hisface with his handkerchief; but as his sister told him, his martialappearance in the uniform of the Seven Oaks cadets was rather spoiledby "a smootchy face." There wasn't time then, however, to make anytoilet before the train left. They were off on the short run to SevenOaks in a very few minutes after leaving the _Lanawaxa_.
Tom was very much excited now. He craned his head out of the carwindow to catch the first glimpse of the red brick barracks and dome ofthe gymnasium, which were the two most prominent buildings belonging tothe Academy. Finally the hill on which the school buildings stoodflashed into view. They occupied the summit of the knoll, while theseven great oaks, standing in a sort of druidical circle, dotted thesmooth, sloping lawn that descended to the railroad cut.
"Oh, how ugly!" cried Helen, who had never seen the place before. "Ido hope that Briarwood Hall will be prettier than _that_, or I shallwant to run back home the very first week."
Her brother smiled in a most superior way.
"That's just like a girl," he said. "Wanting a school to look pretty!Pshaw! I want to see a jolly crowd of fellows, that's what I want. Ihope I'll get in with a good crowd. I know Gil Wentworth, who camehere last year, and he says he'll put me in with a nice bunch. That'swhat I'm looking forward to."
The train was slowing down. There was a handsome brick station and along platform. This was crowded with boys, all in military garb likeTom's own. They looked so very trim and handsome that Helen and Ruthwere quite excited. There were boys ranging from little fellows often, in knickerbockers, to big chaps whose mustaches were sprouting ontheir upper lips.
"Oh, dear me!" gasped Ruth. "See what a crowd we have got to gothrough. All those boys!"
"That's all right," Tom said, gruffly. "I'll see you to the stage.There it stands yonder--and a jolly old scarecrow of a carriage it is,too!"
He was evidently feeling somewhat flurried himself. He was going tomeet more than half the great school informally right there at thestation. They had gathered to meet and greet "freshmen."
But the car in which our friends rode stopped well along the platformand very near the spot where the old, brown, battered, and dust-coveredstage coach, drawn by two great, bony horses, stood in the fallsunshine. Most of the Academy boys were at the other end of theplatform.
Gil Wentworth, Tom's friend, had given young Cameron several pointersas to his attitude on arrival at the Seven Oaks station. He had beenadvised to wear the school uniform (he had passed the entranceexaminations two months before) so as to be less noticeable in thecrowd.
Very soon a slow and dirge-like chant arose from the cadets gathered onthe station platform. From the rear cars of the train had steppedseveral boys in citizen's garb, some with parents or guardians and somealone, and all burdened with more or less baggage and a doubtful airthat proclaimed them immediately "new boys." The hymn of greeting rosein mournful cadence:
"Freshie! Freshie! How-de-do! We're all waiting here for you. Hold your head up! Square each shoulder! Thrust your chest out! _Do_ look bolder!
Mamma's precious--papa's man-- Keep the tears back if you can. Sob! Sob! Sob! It's an awful job-- Freshie's leaving home and mo-o-ther!"
The mournful wailing of that last word cannot be expressed by meretype. There were other verses, too, and as the new boys filed off intothe path leading up to the Academy with their bags and otherencumbrances, the uniformed boys, _en masse_, got into step behind themand tramped up the hill, singing this dreadful dirge. The unfortunatenew arrivals had to listen to the chant all the way up the hill. Ifthey ran to get away from the crowd, it only made them look the moreridiculous; the only sensible way was to endure it with a grin.
Tom grinned widely himself, for he had certainly been overlooked. Or,he thought so until he had placed the two girls safely in the bigomnibus, had kissed Helen good-bye, and shaken hands with Ruth. Butthe girls, looking out of the open door of the coach, saw him descendfrom the step into the midst of a group of solemn-faced boys who hadonly held back out of politeness to the girls whom Tom escorted.
Helen and Ruth, stifling their amusement, heard and saw poor Tom putthrough a much more severe examination than the other boys, for thevery reason that he had come dressed in his uniform. He was forced toendure a searching inquiry regarding his upbringing and privateaffairs, right within the delighted hearing of the wickedly gigglinggirls. And then a tall fellow started to put him through the manual ofarms.
Poor Tom was all at sea in that, and the youth, with gravity, declaredthat he was insulting the uniform by his ignorance and caused him toremove his coat and turn it inside out; and so Helen and Ruth saw himmarched away with his stern escort, in a most ridiculous red flannelgarment (the lining of the coat) which made him conspicuous from everybarrack window and, indeed, from every part of the academy hill.
"Oh, dear me!" sighed Helen, wiping her eyes and almost sobbing afterher laughter. "And Tommy thought he would escape any form of hazing!He wasn't so cute as he thought he was."
But Ruth suddenly became serious. "Suppose we are greeted in any suchway at Briarwood?" she exclaimed. "I believe some girls are horrid.They have hazing in some girls' schools, I've read. Of course, itwon't hurt us, Helen----"
"It'll be just fun, I think!" cried the enthusiastic Helen and then shestopped with an explosive "Oh!"
There was being helped into the coach by the roughly dressed andbewhiskered driver, the little, doll-like, foreign woman whom theythought had been left behind at Portageton.
"There ye air, Ma'mzell!" this old fellow said. "An' here's yerbag--an' yer umbrella--an' yer parcel. All there, be ye? Wal, wal,wal! So I got two more gals fer Briarwood; hev I?"
He was a jovial, rough old fellow, with a wind-blown face and beard andhair enough to make his head look to be as big as a bushel basket. Hewas dressed in a long, faded "duster" over his other nondescriptgarments, and his battered hat was after the shape of those worn byGrand Army men. He limped, too, and was slow in his movements anddeliberate in his speech.
"I s'pose ye _be_ goin' ter Briarwood, gals?" he added, curiously.
"Yes," replied Ruth.
"Where's yer baggage?" he asked.
"We only have our bags. Our trunks have gone by the way of Lumberton,"explained Ruth.
"Ah! Well! All right!" grunted the driver, and started to shut thedoor. Then he glanced from Ruth and Helen to the little foreign lady."I leave ye in good hands," he said, with a hoarse chuckle. "This herelady is one o' yer teachers, Ma'mzell Picolet." He pronounced thelittle lady's name quite as outlandishly as he did "mademoiselle." Itsounded like "Pickle-yet" on his tongue.
"That will do, M'sieur Dolliver," said the little lady, rather tartly."I may venture to introduce myself--is it not?"
She did not raise her veil. She spoke English with scarcely anyaccent. Occasionally she arranged her phrases in an oddly foreign way;but her pronunciation could not be criticised. Old Dolliver, the stagedriver, grinned broadly as he closed the door.
"Ye allus make me feel like a Frenchman myself, when ye say 'moosher,'Ma'mzell," he chuckled.
"You are going to Briarwood Hall, then, my young ladies?" said MissPicolet.
"Yes, Ma'am," said Ruth, shyly.
"I shall be your teacher in the French language--perhaps in deportmentand the graces of life," the little lady said, pleasantly. "You willboth enter into advanced classes, I hope?"
Helen, after all, was more shy than Ruth with strangers. When shebecame acquainted she gained confidence rapidly. But now Ruth answeredagain for both:
"I was ready to enter the Cheslow High School; Helen is as far advancedas I am in all studies, Miss Picolet."
"Good!" returned the teacher. "We shall get on famously with suchbright girls," and she nodded several times.
But she was not really companionable. She
never raised her veil. Andshe only talked with the girls by fits and starts. There were longspaces of time when she sat huddled in the corner of her seat, with herface turned from them, and never said a word.
But the nearer the rumbling old stagecoach approached the promised landof Briarwood Hall the more excited Ruth and Helen became. They gazedout of the open windows of the coach doors and thought the countrythrough which they traveled ever so pretty. Occasionally old Dolliverwould lean out from his seat, twist himself around in a most impossibleattitude so as to see into the coach, and bawl out to the two girlssome announcement of the historical or other interest of the localitiesthey passed.
Suddenly, as they surmounted a long ridge and came out upon the moreopen summit, they espied a bridle path making down the slope, throughan open grove and across uncultivated fields beyond--a vast blueberrypasture. Up this path a girl was coming. She swung her hat by itsstrings in her hand and commenced to run up the hill when she spied thecoach.
She was a thin, wiry, long-limbed girl. She swung her hat excitedlyand although the girls in the coach could not hear her, they knew thatshe shouted to Old Dolliver. He pulled up, braking the lumberingwheels grumblingly. The newcomer's sharp, freckled face grew plainerto the interested gaze of Ruth and Helen as she came out of the shadowof the trees into the sunlight of the dusty highway.
"Got any Infants, Dolliver?" the girl asked, breathlessly.
"Two on 'em, Miss Cox," replied the stage driver.
"Then I'm in time. Of course, nobody's met 'em?"
"Hist! Ma'mzell's in there," whispered Dolliver, hoarsely.
"Oh! She!" exclaimed Miss Cox, with plain scorn of the French teacher."That's all right, Dolliver. I'll get in. Ten cents, mind you, fromhere to Briarwood. That's enough."
"All right, Miss Cox. Ye allus was a sharp one," chuckled Dolliver, asthe sharp-faced girl jerked open the nearest door of the coach andstared in, blinking, out of the sunlight.