CHAPTER XIV--THE FETE
Behold Fairyland!
Well, at least an excellent imitation of what Fairyland must look like.Overhead, a clear, star-sprinkled sky; below, scores of gaily-huedlanterns shedding their soft glow over a charming scene. Through theside gate, please, on School Park. Twenty-five cents to the boy on dutythere, and you are inside, with the manifold attractions awaiting you.On three sides of the transformed garden are the college booths, eachdecked with bunting and flags of appropriate colors, and each presidedover by a patriotically attired young lady who will gladly, nay,eagerly, sell you almost anything from a cake of soap ("Donated by theTown Square Pharmacy, H. J. Congreve, Prop'r.") to a knitted sweater ora gingham house-dress ("Compliments of The New York Store, High ClassDry Goods"). Near at hand, Yale is represented by Miss Polly Deane,capped and aproned in blue, her eyes sparkling and her voice sweetlyinsistent: "Won't you buy something, please, sir? Post-cards, two forfive! These pictures are only fifty cents, all beautifully framed andready for hanging! Can I sell you something, ma'am?"
Beyond, gay with orange and black, is the Princeton booth; and stillbeyond, Dartmouth and Columbia and California; and then, a blur ofbrilliant crimson through the leafage, Harvard. And so on all around thegarden, with merry voices sounding above the chatter of the throng thatmoves here and there. Down the center of Fairyland runs a leafy tunnelfrom within which blue and red and yellow and green rays twinkle. There,under the hanging lanterns, little tables and chairs are dotted on thegravel, and half a dozen aproned youths are busy bearing, not alwayswithout mishap, plates of salad and rolls and dishes of ice-cream andcake. Close to the back of the house is a platform illumined by a row ofelectric lights, the one glaring spot in the area of soft radiance.
"How's it going?" asked a heavily-built youth of a slimmer one who hadpaused at the entrance to the arbor.
"Hello, Kewpie! Oh, bully, so far. We took in eighty-four dollars thisafternoon, and we'll do at least twice as well to-night. They're stillcoming. Have you seen Whipple anywhere?"
"Yes, a minute ago, down at the Pennsylvania booth. She's a mightypretty girl, too, Nod. I bought a pocket-knife of her for a quarter, andgot stung; but I don't mind. I'm going back to get another pretty soon.When do I have to sing again?"
"You follow Wilson's clog-dance. We're switching you and Cheesman,Kewpie. His stuff is corking, but it's pretty high-brow, and we thoughtyou'd better bring up the end and make the audience feel cheerful."
"All right; but it won't feel very cheerful if those orchestra guysdon't do better than they did this afternoon. They were four or fivenotes behind me once! Nid said you had a new stunt thisevening--something you left out this afternoon."
"Yes; we couldn't work it in daylight very well. It ought to go fineto-night, though."
"What is it?"
"You wait and see. I've got to find Whipple. Say, if you see Ned, tellhim I'll be at the platform in five minutes and want him to meet methere. Everybody keeps getting lost here!"
On the way past the arbor, Laurie ran into George Watson, returningacross lots balancing a couple of plates in one hand and holding a largeslab of cake in the other, from which he nibbled as he went. "Hello!" hesaid, none too distinctly. "I've been looking for you."
"Wanted to bring me refreshments, I suppose."
George looked at the empty plates, laughed, and shook his head. "Notexactly. I've been feeding Cornell. Somebody ought to take eats to thosegirls, Nod; they're starving!"
"All right; you do it."
"What do you think I am? A millionaire? I bought Mae a salad and anice-cream, and I'm about broke. Lend me a half, will you? Thanks. Wantan ice-cream? I'll treat."
"No, thanks. Have you seen Dan Whipple?"
"Sure! He's over at the Pennsylvania booth, buying it out! Say,everything's going great, isn't it? Couldn't have had a finer evening,either, what? Well, see you later. I'm hungry!" And George continued hisway to the house, where Miss Tabitha, surrounded by willing and hungryhelpers, presided sternly, but most capably, over the refreshments.
At eight o'clock the boy on duty at the entrance estimated theattendance as close to two hundred, which, added to the eighty-six paidadmissions before supper, brought the total close to the first estimateof three hundred. It is safe to say that every Hillman's boy attendedthe fete either in the afternoon or evening, and that most of thefaculty came and brought Mrs. Faculty--when there was a Mrs. Faculty.Doctor Hillman was spied by Laurie purchasing a particularly useless andunlovely article in burnt wood from the auburn-haired Miss Hatch. Everyone seemed to be having a good time, and the only fly in the ointment ofthe committee was the likelihood that the refreshments would beexhausted far too soon.
The Weather Man had kindly provided an evening of exceptional warmth,with scarcely enough breeze to sway the paper lanterns that glowed fromend to end of the old garden, an evening so warm that ice-cream was morein demand than sandwiches or salad; and fortunately so, since ice-creamwas the one article of refreshment that could be and was replenished.If, said Ned, folks would stick to ice-cream and go light on the otherrefreshments, they might get through. To which Laurie agreed, and Nedhied him to the telephone and ordered another freezer sent up.
At a few minutes after eight the Banjo and Mandolin Club took possessionof the chairs behind the platform and dashed into a military march.Following that, six picked members of the Gymnastic Club did some veryclever work, and Cheesman, a tall and rather soulful-looking uppermiddler, sang two ballads very well indeed, and then, as an encore,quite took the joy out of life with "Suwanee River"! Little MissComfort, present through the courtesy of the Committee on Arrangements,sniffled quite audibly, but was heard to declare that "it was just toosweet for anything!" A rather embarrassed junior attempted some cardtricks that didn't go very well, and then Wilson, garbed more or less inthe character of an Irish gentleman returning from Donnybrook Fair, andswinging a shillaly, did some jig-dancing that was really clever and wonmuch applause.
There was a brief unofficial intermission while three anxious committeemembers made search for Kewpie Proudtree. He was presently discoveredconsuming his fourth plate of ice-cream in the seclusion of the sideporch, and was haled away, protesting, to the platform. In spite of whatmay seem an over-indulgence in refreshment, Kewpie was in excellentvoice and a jovial mood, and sang four rollicking songs in a manner thatcaptured his audience. In fact, long after Kewpie had vanished from thepublic gaze and returned to his ice-cream, the audience still demandedmore.
Its attention was eventually captured, however, by Dan Whipple, whoannounced importantly that it gave him much pleasure to say that, at agreat expense, the committee had secured as an added attraction theworld-famed Signor Duodelli, who, with their kind permission, wouldexhibit for their pleasure and astoundment his miraculous act known asthe Vanishing Man, as performed before the crowned heads of Europe, tothe bewilderment and applause of all beholders. "Ladies and gentlemen,Signor Duodelli!"
The Signor had a noticeable likeness to Lew Cooper, in spite of hisgorgeous mustache and flowing robe of red and purple cheese-cloth. Yetit might not have been Lew, for his manner was extremely foreign and hisgestures and the few words he used in directing the arranging of his"properties" were unmistakably Latin. The properties consisted of akitchen chair, a threefold screen covered with black baize, and a coilof rope. There was also in evidence a short wand, but the Signor heldthat in his hand, waving it around most eloquently. The audience laughedand applauded and waited patiently until the chair had been placedexactly to the Signor's liking, close to the back of the platform, andthe screen beside it. Previously several of the lights had been put out,and those that remained threw their glare on the front of the stage,leaving the back, while discernible, less in evidence.
"Now," announced the Signor, narrowly escaping from falling off theplatform as he tripped over his robe, "I aska da some one coma up andgiva da help. Any one I aska. You, Signor, maybe, eh?" The magicianpointed his wand at Mr. Cornish, in the fro
nt of the clustered audience;but the gentleman laughingly declined. The Signor seemed disappointed."No-o-o? You no geta da hurt. Some one else, eh?" He looked invitinglyaround, and a small junior, urged by his companions, struggled to thefront. Unfortunately for his ambitions to pose in the lime-light, theSignor's glance had moved to another quarter, and, ere the junior couldget his attention, a volunteer appeared from the semi-obscurity of thekitchen porch. He was peculiarly attired, wearing a simple white garmenthaving a strong resemblance to the old-fashioned night-shirt, thatcovered him completely from neck to ankles. He was bareheaded, revealingthe fact that his locks were red-brown in hue.
"Ah!" exclaimed the Signor, delightedly. "You will helpa me, _si_? Rightthisa way, Signor. I thanka you!"
"That's one of the Turner fellows," muttered a boy, while the smalljunior and his companions called "Fake!" loudly. However, thegood-natured laughter of the audience drowned the accusation, and sometwo hundred pairs of eyes watched amusedly and expectantly while, withthe assistance of two other volunteers, the youth in the white robe wastied securely to the chair.
"Maka him tight," directed the Signor, enthusiastically, waving hiswand. "Pulla da knot. Ha, thata da way! Good! Signors, I thanka you!"
The two who had tied the victim to the chair retired from the platform.The Signor seized the screen and opened it wide and turned it around andclosed it and turned it again.
"You seea?" he demanded. "There is nothing that deceive! Now, then, Iplacea da screen so!" He folded it around the boy and the chair, leavingonly the side away from the audience uncovered. He drew away the widthof the platform, and, "Music, ifa you please," he requested. Theorchestra, whose members had moved their chairs to one side, struck up amerry tune, and the Signor, folding his arms, bent a rapt gaze on theblank, impenetrable blackness of the screen. A brief moment passed. Thenthe Signor bade the music cease, took a step forward, and pointed to thescreen.
"Away!" he cried, and swung his arm in a half-circle, his body followingwith a weird flaring of his brilliant robes until, with outstretchedfinger, he faced the audience. "Ha! He come! Thisa way, Signor! Comeaquick!"
As one man the audience turned and followed the pointing finger. Throughthe deserted arbor came a boy in a white garment. He pushed his waythrough the throng and jumped to the stage. As he did so, the Signorwhisked aside the screen. There was the chair empty, and there was therope dangling from it, twisted and knotted.
A moment of surprised silence gave place to hearty applause.Theoretically it might have been possible for the boy in the chair tovanish from behind the screen, reach the farther end of the garden, andrun back into sight; but actually, as the audience realized on secondthought, it couldn't possibly have been done in the few seconds, surelynot more than ten, that had elapsed between the placing of the screenand the appearance of the boy behind them. And then, how had he gothimself free from the rope? An audience likes to be puzzled, and thisone surely was. The garden hummed with conjecture and discussion. Therewere some there who could have explained the seeming phenomenon, butthey held their counsel.
Meanwhile, on the platform the Signor was modestly bowing alternately tothe audience and to his subject, the latter apparently no worse for hismagic transposition. And the orchestra again broke into its interruptedmelody. The applause became insistent, but Signor Duodelli, perhapsbecause his contract with the committee called for no further evidenceof his powers, only bowed and bowed and at last disappeared into theobscurity of the shadows. Whereupon the Banjo and Mandolin Club movedinto the house, and presently the strains of a one-step summoned thedancers to the big drawing-room.
Laurie, unconsciously rubbing a wrist, smiled as he listened to thecomments of the dissolving audience. "Well, but there's no gettingaround the fact that it was the same boy," declared a pompous littlegentleman to his companion. "Same hair and eyes and everything! Couldn'tbe two boys as much alike, eh? Not possibly! Very clever!"
Laurie chuckled as he made his way to Polly's booth. That young ladylooked a little tired, and, by the same token, so did the Yale booth!Only a bare dozen framed pictures and a small number of post-cardsremained of her stock. "Don't you think I've done awfully well?" askedPolly, a trifle pathetically. She seemed to need praise, and Lauriesupplied it.
"Corking, Polly," he assured her. "I guess you've sold more than any ofthe others, haven't you?"
"N-no, I guess some of the others have done better, Nod; but I thinkthey had more attractive articles, don't you? Anyhow, I've taken intwelve dollars and thirty cents since supper, and I made four dollarsand eighty-five cents this afternoon; only I must have dropped a dimesomewhere, for I'm ten cents short. Or perhaps someone didn't give methe right amount."
"Why, that's seventeen dollars!" exclaimed Laurie. "I didn't think youhad anywhere near seventeen dollars' worth of things here, Polly!"
"Oh, I didn't! Not nearly! Why, if I'd sold things at the prices markedon them, Nod, I wouldn't have had more than half as much! But lots offolks _wanted_ to pay more, and I let them. Mr. Conklin, the jeweler,bought a picture, one of the funny landscapes with the frames thatdidn't fit at the corners, and he said it was ridiculous to sell it fora quarter, and he gave me a dollar for it. Then he held the picture upand just laughed and laughed at it! I guess he just wanted to spend hismoney, don't you? You know, Ned said we were to get as much as we couldfor things, so I usually added ten cents to the price that was marked onthem--sometimes more, if a person looked extravagant. One lady came backand said she'd paid twenty-five cents for a picture and it was markedfifteen on the back. I said I was sorry she was dissatisfied and I'd bevery glad to buy it back from her for twenty."
Laurie laughed. "What did she say to that?" he asked.
"She said if I wanted it bad enough to pay twenty cents for it sheguessed it was worth twenty-five, and went off and didn't come back."Polly laughed and then sighed. "I'm awfully tired. Doesn't that musicsound lovely? Do you dance?"
Laurie shook his head. "No; but, say, if you want to go in there, I'llwatch the booth for you."
Polly hesitated. "It's funny you don't," she said. "Don't you like it?"
It was Laurie's turn to hesitate. "No, not much. I never have danced.It--it seems sort of silly." He looked at Polly doubtfully. Although hewouldn't have acknowledged it, he was more than half sorry that dancingwas not included among his accomplishments.
"It isn't silly at all," asserted Polly, almost indignantly. "You oughtto learn. Mae could teach you to one-step in no time at all!"
"I guess that's about the way I'd do it," answered Laurie, sadly--"in notime at all! Don't you--couldn't _you_ teach a fellow?"
"I don't believe so. I never tried to teach any one. Besides, Mae danceslots better than I do. She put the things she had left on GraceBoswell's booth and went inside the minute the music started. She wantedme to come, but I thought I shouldn't," added Polly, virtuously.
"You go ahead now," urged Laurie. "I'll stay here till you come back. Itisn't fair for you girls to miss the dancing. Besides, I guess therewon't be much more sold now. Folks have begun to go, some of them, andmost of the others are inside."
Polly looked toward the house. Through the big wide-open windows thelilting music of a waltz floated out. The Banjo and Mandolin Club wasreally doing very well to-night. Polly sighed once and looked wistful.Then she shook her head. "Thanks, Nod," she said, "but I guess I'll stayhere. Some one _might_ come."
"What do you care? You don't own 'em! Anyway, I guess I could sell apost-card if I had to!"
"You'd have trouble selling any of those pictures," laughed Polly."Aren't they dreadful? Where did they come from?"
"Pretty fierce," Laurie agreed. "They came from the MetropolitanFurniture Store. The man dug them out of a corner in the cellar. I guesshe'd had them for years! Anyway, there was enough dust on them to chokeyou. He seemed awfully tickled when we agreed to take them and let himalone!"
"I should think he might have! We girls agreed to buy things from eachother, just to help, but the o
nly things they bought from me werepost-cards!" Polly laughed as though at some thought; and Laurie, whohad elevated himself to an empty corner of the booth and was swinginghis feet against the blue draping in front, looked inquiringly. "I wasjust thinking about the boys," explained Polly.
"What about them? What boys do you mean?" Laurie asked coldly.
"The high school boys. They're awfully peeved because we girls took partin this, and not one of them has been here, I guess."
"Cheeky beggars," grumbled Laurie. "Guess we can do without them,though. Here comes Bob's father."
Mr. Starling was bent on a most peculiar mission. Laurie and Pollywatched him stop at the next booth and engage in conversation. Then afat pocket-book was produced, a bill was tendered, and Mr. Starlingstrolled on. At the Yale booth he stopped again.
"Well, Turner," he greeted, "this affair looks like a huge success,doesn't it? Why aren't you young folks inside there, dancing?"
"I don't dance, sir," answered Laurie, somewhat to his chagrin in a mostapologetic tone. "And Polly thinks she ought to stand by the ship. Thisis Polly Deane, Mr. Starling."
Bob's father shook hands cordially across the depleted counter andassured its proprietor that he was very glad indeed to make heracquaintance. Then he added: "But you don't seem to have much left, MissPolly. Now, I'm a great hand at a bargain. I dare say that if you mademe a fair price for what there is here I'd jump at it. What do you say?"
Polly apparently didn't know just what to say for a minute, and her gazesought counsel of Laurie.
"If you ask me," laughed the latter, "I'd say fifty cents was a bigprice for the lot!"
"You're not in charge," said Mr. Starling, almost severely. "I'm surethe young lady has better business ability. Suppose you name a price,Miss Polly."
"We-ell--" Polly did some mental arithmetic, and then, doubtfully: "Adollar and a half, sir," she said.
"Done!" replied Mr. Starling. He drew forth a two-dollar bill. "Thereyou are! Just leave the things where they are. I'll look after themlater. Now you youngsters go in and dance. What's this? Change? My dearyoung lady, don't you know that change is never given at an affair ofthis kind? I really couldn't think of taking it. It--it's a criminaloffense!" And Mr. Starling nodded and walked away.
"By Jove, he's a brick!" exclaimed Laurie, warmly. "Look, he's doing thesame thing everywhere!"
"I know," answered Polly, watching. "It's just dear of him, isn't it?But, Nod, _what_ do you suppose he will do with these awful pictures?"
"The same thing he will do with that truck he's buying now," was thelaughing reply. "He will probably put them in the furnace!"
"Well," said Polly, after a moment, "I suppose we might as well goinside, don't you? We can look on, anyway, and"--with a stifledsigh--"I'd 'most as lief look on as dance."
Laurie followed, for the second time in his life wishing that theTerpsichorean art had been included in his education!