She whizzed past a farmhouse with three old ladies sitting knitting on the porch and was gone before they discovered she was a girl and not a boy. She shied around a red rooster that was strutting in the road; she flashed by a great dog who was lying in wait to bark at her and chase her, as she pedaled up a long, slow hill with the ease of a bird on wing, coasting down again with a broad sweep of meadow and the crossroads ahead of her.
Then suddenly her golden visions vanished and she was hurled back into her hateful world of self-consciousness again. For there, ahead of her, she saw a shining new car, halting at the crossroads, as if its driver were uncertain which road to take, and another glance at him showed something familiar about the set of his shoulders. Was it, could it be that that was Lawrence Earle? And he had missed the way, of course. He had probably meant to join the party on the pike and missed them, or perhaps they had not carefully outlined their route to him.
She knew perfectly which way they intended to take. She had heard it talked about when she was behind the Garner’s hedge and by Eleanor at the dinner table. If this had been anyone else in the world, or any other party of excursionists that he was intending to join, Effie would not have hesitated an instant. She would have ridden with all her might and reached him and told him where he ought to go, that he should turn back at once and take the crossroad to the pike three miles back.
But this was not the usual Effie. This was an awakening girl with a fierce grievance and a heart full of bitterness. What? Warn this young man that he was going away from the rendezvous? Never! She would sooner do anything than that. Help those hateful girls and that supercilious young man who had made fun of her once to come together and have a good time? Not if it were to pour the largest, hottest coals of fire on their heads! She would glory in their separation. It served them right. And there settled down over her a sense of satisfaction that there was an occasional balancing of punishments in this world, and those girls were getting one now. Nevertheless, it made her a little uncomfortable when she looked back to see Mr. Earle riding along on the road she had taken, getting farther and farther away from where he was supposed to want to go, when a word from her might have set him right. He would probably pass her in a moment, so she concluded to put him out of mind by putting him out of sight; and setting spurs to her steed, she wheeled sharply into a road at the right, level as a table, and tried to rejoice in her sense of freedom. Let him go on and lose his way. It was nothing to her!
Suddenly she became aware that for some minutes there had been a sound of rapid hoofs behind her, but she had been enjoying herself too much to pay heed to them. Now as the sounds drew nearer, and she turned her head to see who was driving so madly, she saw it was a grocery wagon, driverless, coming at full speed, the horse apparently almost beside himself with fear, the lines flying in the wind, and its only occupant a little fair-haired child, a tiny boy with golden curls blowing in the breeze, too young to understand, and just old enough to cling to the seat and be frightened. It was a miracle that he had not been thrown out on the hard pavement some distance back. In a moment more that horse would pass her. Instinctively, she swerved aside to be out of his way. And now he had passed her, and the blue-eyed baby looked at her and gave a cry and a beseeching look, and it made her think of her own baby brother’s face when he was frightened or hurt. Just ahead, a quarter of a mile, was a sharp turn and a steep hill with a great yawning quarry hole at one side. The baby would be almost certain to be thrown out there, and there was scarcely a chance of any rescue, unless—oh, could she? With a thought of whether she had a right to risk so much when she had so little power to help, she put all her strength to her bicycle and shot down the road after the horse. She could easily outdistance him in a moment or two if she tried and then—but there was no time for thought—she must ride alongside and catch the bridle or the reins, or something, and stop that horse. She must, or the baby would be killed, and if she did not try, she would all her life feel responsible for his life. Not that she really thought this out. It might be said to have flashed through her brain. She acted. Quick as light flashes so her bicycle obeyed her motion. She leaned forward now with all her might to get the greatest power and make the quickest time, with no more thought of trying to ride in a ladylike position. She wished a man were here to act instead of herself, and so increase the chance of saving the baby. She saw no man ahead now and thought of the one she had just passed, and wished he were there, for maybe he could help. She forgot that she had just been hating him. She forgot everything but just what she was doing, and then as quick as thought she was beside the foaming horse, wheeling steadily step-by-step abreast of him, and making ready for her next move. Now her boyish practice of riding this way and that, standing on one pedal or on the saddle, riding on the front and the back and the side, and every other part of her bicycle, stood her in good stead. Just how she did it she could not tell afterward, but she caught that horse by the bit and held him for one long, awful, rushing minute, when everything in the world she had ever done passed over her head in clear sequence, and she felt that the end had come. She heard a car coming. Would it be too late? The horse was rearing and plunging again. Could she possibly hold out till someone came? Then a strong hand was placed firmly over hers, and a steady voice said, “Whoa, now, whoa! Steady, boy, steady!” And the horse gradually slackened his pace, and she caught a glimpse of the golden-haired baby still clinging to the seat. She dropped in a little heap somewhere in the road not far from her bicycle, and everything grew black and still about her.
Chapter 5
Lawrence Earle was one of the most admired and envied young men in town. Since he had been a little child, playing in the yard of his father’s beautiful home, people had watched him and pointed him out and said, “See, that is Lawrence Earle. His father is the wealthiest man in this part of the country, and his mother is one of the very finest women you will find. She is beautiful and dresses like a flower and has everything her heart could wish, that money can buy. And yet she is just as sweet and gracious and good as if she had nothing to make her proud.”
Lawrence did not grow up behind stone walls and high hedges, too good to have anything to do with the other boys. He went to the public school and took his place with the rest. He played baseball better than anyone else in his class, they used to say, even when he was in the primary grades. He could swim and climb anything, and he could fight if it became necessary to set something right.
But Lawrence Earle had always stood for fine things. He was always on the level, honest, even if it went against him to be, and the boys said he was so decent that he couldn’t be any more decent.
He stood high in his classes, in spite of the fact that he went out for athletics and was always ready for fun. While he was in grammar school and high school, his house was always the center of all the school social doings, and his mother always ready to help in any sudden party or picnic proposed. She was one of them, “a good sport,” they used to call her. The boys adored her, and girls admired her and tried to imitate her.
One of the nicest features of these social affairs was that there were no class distinctions; all, whether rich or poor, were welcomed alike.
But when Lawrence went away to college, these social affairs at the Earle home largely ceased. Nearly all of Lawrence’s close friends were also away at college or gone to work somewhere. Therefore, it was that the younger set, of whom the Garner girls and Eleanor Martin were members, knew Lawrence and his famous good times only afar. They had been the little children when Lawrence was growing up.
When, therefore, it began to be noised abroad that Lawrence had graduated and would be coming home in a few days, all the younger set, who now considered themselves “the” set, began to scheme how they might get hold of him, for they longed to experience for themselves some of those wonderful good times they had heard their older brothers and sisters talk about.
Lawrence had gained distinction in college, of course, and the news of his successes had drifted h
ome in one way or another. Several of the town boys were in the same college with him, and there was no lack of knowledge concerning his attainments and successes.
Football, basketball, baseball, and scholarship alike seemed to claim him as a hero. The scores he made as captain of this team and that were watched in the papers. When he made Phi Beta Kappa, there was a long article about it in the town paper. And everybody who had any acquaintance whatsoever with him or his family spoke of it to everybody else and said how nice it was, and that it was, of course, to have been expected of a boy like Lawrence. In fact, there were no other boys just like Lawrence, they all agreed.
In short, Lawrence was in a fair way to have his head turned, and a stranger hearing all his praises sounded would have been likely to feel that Lawrence Earle was a most spoiled, conceited, impossible youth. He was rich and good-looking and smart. What more could a young man have?
But Lawrence Earle had a sensible mother who had early taught him that nothing he had was really his own, only a gift from God, to be most carefully and generously used, else it might be taken from him. And as he grew up, he showed that he had not a grain of selfishness or conceit in him.
Yet in spite of what he had been, the friends and neighbors who had watched him grow up and learned to love and admire him, watched for his homecoming with fear and trembling. For how could it be that a boy with as many things to make him proud as this one, could possibly go through college with such honors as he had won and not grow proud, at least to some extent?
Speculation was rife among the elders. What would the young man do when he came back with his education completed? Would he study law and accept a partnership with his uncle, who was somewhat famous as a lawyer in that region? Would he take up a business career as his wealthy father had done? Or would he have a line of his own, journalism perhaps, or philosophy, or art? Everyone was interested and wondering.
But the young girls were all a flutter to get him to their parties, and Eleanor Martin secretly took a few lessons in dancing, though her father and mother did not approve of that amusement, in order that she might not appear awkward before this elegant stranger when he should return and invite them all to his parties, perhaps.
But Lawrence Earle rode into town late in the evening in his own car and drove quietly up to his mother’s door, and made no fuss at all about his homecoming. And when he found on the desk in his old room a pile of invitations, he swept them all aside, and said, “Mother, I don’t have to go to any of these things just yet, do I? I’m bored to death with functions. I just want to spend a little quiet time with you for a few days before I see anyone, can’t I?”
And his mother, with a light in her eyes, smiled and assented.
“Dear, it’s to be just as you want it. If you have any friends you want, they’ll be welcome as always. But it will be my greatest joy to have you all to myself for a while, if that will please you best.”
“Suits me to a T, Mother dear! I want to take you off on one or two long drives, and we’ll have a smashing old-time picnic all by ourselves, like we used to when I was a little kid. I need that to get back to living again. And besides, I’ve a lot of things to tell you that have developed this year and I hadn’t time to write. We’ve got to have a little leisure for this. About the middle of next week, Jimmy and Bryan will come on for a few days on their way to India. I must tell you all about them. They’re great! You’ll like ’em. And Ted will run down for a few days, and we’ll have to get some of the boys together to meet him, but aside from that I’ve no plans. If you have, I’m perfectly willing, only wait a few days, won’t you, so I can get my bearings?”
His mother smiled, the glad light growing in her eyes. Her boy was unchanged, unspoiled. She held her head proudly.
“There aren’t many of the old crowd left, are there? Sam Jones and the Mills boys are down at the foundry, you said, and Fetler is married. Poor little fish! Why didn’t he wait till he had enough money to support a wife? And Cappellar is in California, and Jarvis is gone to New York to study medicine, and Butler and Williams went to South America, and Judson is dead. That leaves Brown and Tommy Moore and the Ellsworths of my class, doesn’t it? I was counting them up on my way home. Not many for a reunion.”
“You don’t say anything about the girls,” suggested his mother.
“Oh, the girls. Well there weren’t so many of them that mattered. Margaret Martin is married, you wrote. I hope she got a good man. She certainly was a peach of a girl! And Wilda Hadley eloped. She always was a fool. Lilly Garner married, too, didn’t she? Lives in New York, you said. What became of Evelyn Bradley? She was the prettiest girl in the class, and knew it, too, didn’t she? Remember the time I caught her posing before that mirror at our senior class party?”
“Evelyn is out in Hollywood in the movies,” said Mrs. Earle, a little sadly. “It was a great disappointment to her mother. She tried to keep her at home. Evelyn has a younger sister now who is even prettier than she was. Don’t you remember Maud, a little bit of a black-eyed girl with soft black curls?”
“Can’t say I do,” answered Lawrence. “I suppose all those babies have grown up, haven’t they?”
“Yes”—smiled the mother—“it’s the babies that were then who are inviting you now. I think Maud is one of those girls in that picnic tomorrow. They came here to ask me if I thought you would come, and I promised to tell you all about it. The Garner girls and Eleanor Martin and Janet Chipley, and a new girl, Cornelia Gilson, very modern with glorious red hair. I’m not sure that I admire her type. Oh, you wouldn’t know the parties nowadays, Lawrence! They’re nothing like the good times you used to have here at home. Why, they wouldn’t be satisfied three minutes with the games you used to play and have such grand times with. They’ve got to dance, dance, dance, and flirt. ‘Petting’ they call it now. My dear! But you haven’t lived out of the world, Son. You know what life is now.”
“Yes, I’ve lived out of it a good deal, Mother, though I know what you mean. I had sort of hoped it wouldn’t have penetrated to our town yet, but I suppose that wasn’t to be expected. But if it’s like that here, too, we’ll just cut it out. I haven’t any use at all for it. Will you make my excuses to those girls, Mother, or shall I have to write?”
“I suppose you had better write a note, Son. But even then they may come down upon you and carry you off. They are perfectly crazy to have you go on this excursion. They have been planning it for days and arranged the time with a special view to your being here.”
“Well, I can’t help it; I’m not going,” said Lawrence, with a firm set of his jaw. “I hate that sort of thing anyway. Why shouldn’t you and I run off for a day, take a drive to Aunt Lila’s or something, and don’t return till the blamed thing is over?”
“I’d love to,” said the mother, “but unfortunately I’ve got a meeting for that day, the Mite Society, and it’s away, out in the country at old Mrs. Petrie’s. You remember her? She is lame and blind and the ladies are going out there to give her a little pleasure, as she can’t come in to the meetings anymore. I’d get out of it if I hadn’t promised to take Mrs. Mason’s place leading the devotional, and then I’m also chairman of the refreshment committee and have to look after the luncheon, and in the afternoon we’re going to present Mrs. Petrie with a little purse, and they’ve asked me to make the speech.”
“Well, of course, you’ve got to go. I’ll drive you over. How’ll that be? And then I’ll take a run around to all my old haunts and come back for you in the afternoon? What time do you go?”
“The meeting starts at half past ten, and it isn’t over till three. I’m afraid you’ll get tired traveling around all that time. Why not come back to lunch with us? Mrs. Petrie would be delighted, and so would all the old ladies. And your mother would certainly be proud to show you off to her old friends.”
“Well, I might if I get around. I’ll see. So that’s settled. But how about our getting off early in the morning before anybody can possibly come
around or call up or anything. Wouldn’t you enjoy a ride out to the Rocks, say, before you go to Petrie’s?”
“I certainly would. How ideal. I feel like a girl again with my best boy going to take me out.” And Mrs. Earle stooped and kissed the handsome brow of her son tenderly. “Dear son. It’s so good to have you home again.”
So Lawrence wrote his note and posted it by special delivery, and when Maud Bradley called up in the morning to present a few added attractions and beseech him to reconsider, Lawrence Earle and his mother were driving along the highway at a joyous speed, bound for old Mother Petrie’s, via “the Rocks,” with an ice-cream freezer, two cake boxes, and a big basket of sandwiches stowed in the trunk of the car.
“It’s just too provoking for anything!” said Maud, explaining it to the Garner girls over the telephone. “There I went and made an extra angel cake just for him, and I sat up almost all night to finish the embroidery on my new dress! They say he is just the same as he used to be but I don’t believe it. He’s a snob. He thinks we’re too young for his Royal Highness! But I mean to drag him into our set yet. Mamma’s going to invite him over to dinner Saturday night. She says he used to be real close with Evelyn when they were in school together. We’ll get him yet, and then we’ll have another of these picnics, won’t we?”
“I suppose he thinks we’re too small potatoes,” said Ethel. “But when he learns how speedy we can be, he’ll sit up and take notice. Never mind, Bradley, he’ll come next time. Wait till he hears all we do on this trip. I’ll take measures to have his mother hear all about it. Aunt Beth runs in there often to see her, and Aunt Beth will tell her all about it. By the way, you knew Eleanor was going to be allowed to take her new car, didn’t you? Well, I planned you and the Hall boys and Joe Whiting and Aline would go with her; Minturn, too, can squeeze in if he doesn’t get his own car from the repair shop in time. Reitha and Betty Anne are going with Sam and Fred, and the Loring boys and Jessie Heath will go with us. But it does seem as if half the day was spoiled without Lawrence Earle, doesn’t it? When we’ve counted so on his going, too! Isn’t it hateful?”