Hester's Counterpart Part 12

Each day, before dinner and lunch, there was a quarter-hour relaxation period. To Helen, this was anything but what the name stood for. The loss of her pin troubled her. She was confident that it was somewhere in her bedroom. She very distinctly remembered removing it from her stock and placing it in the cus.h.i.+on which stood on her dresser. There was a possibility of its being knocked off, or being caught in ribbon and ties, and so might have been dropped somewhere. She began a systematic search. One day, she emptied the drawers in the dresser and examined every article there, to be sure that the pin was not clinging to it. She peered under and about each article of furniture. But no pin appeared.

While she was on her knees searching the corners of the room and edges of the rug, Erma appeared in the doorway. She gave a peal of delight.

"Have you turned Moslem; or is it Mohammed who takes long journeys on his knees to do penance? I have pa.s.sed your door twice and each time I find you crawling about on all fours like a Teddy Bear."

"I've lost my pin. I am sick about it."

"I wouldn't be. No pin is worth being even half sick about. Buy yourself another, or better yet, Christmas is coming. Throw out a few gentle hints to your friends. Tell them you have lost your pin. They would be very stupid not to understand that it was their duty to replace it.

Perhaps more than one will respond as becomes friends. You may have a half dozen pins in place of one."

"This cannot be replaced. It has belonged to our family for generations.

The story is that one of the Loraines who were French, for political reasons, left his country and went to Brazil. While there, he discovered valuable mines. Selecting the finest gems, he returned to France and presented them to the king, and was immediately restored to favor. Two stones of the collection were pushed aside as not worthy so great a ruler. Tourie Loraine kept these for himself and had them made into rings. Later the rings were made into earrings. I think that was done by my great-grandfather as a gift to his bride. Grandmother had twin daughters. Earrings were no longer in style and so the stones were made into brooches and set about with her hair. Each little girl was given one. My mother gave hers to me. The other which belonged to Aunt Harriet disappeared years ago."

Erma laughed with delight. She loved romance either in real life or between the pages of a book.

"How perfectly lovely to have such glorious things happen in one's family! Nothing like that ever happened in our family. My people did nothing more exciting than write charters and fight Indians. I think we were very commonplace. It is the French people who have the romantic blood. Tell me some more, Helen. You have no idea how interesting this is."

"There is little more to tell. After the stones had been in our family for several generations, it was discovered by the merest accident, that they were yellow diamonds and very valuable, on account of their size and purity. They were not really yellow, you know, but sometimes reflected a peculiar yellow light. We were sorry that we knew the value of them."

"Sorry! I should think you would have been delighted. I can imagine nothing to be sorry for in finding that what you thought was a pretty little stone, was really worth a great deal of money."

"Because if it had been worthless, someone would never have been tempted as she was. My Aunt Harriet on one of her visits South years before, had found a little colored girl who was mistreated. She brought her North and gave her a home. She fed and clothed her and trained her to be an excellent servant. When she was able to work, Aunt Harriet paid her wages. She learned the value of Aunt Harriet's pins and rings. She disappeared and the jewels with her. There were a whole lot of complications which I cannot go into detail about. But it changed Aunt Harriet's whole life. I remember Rosa so well. She was a beautiful girl.

She did not look like a colored woman. She was scarcely darker than I am, and she had the most beautiful eyes and hands."

"And nothing has been heard of her?" Erma was eager to know. She could have sat there all day to listen and would have forgone both meals and lessons.

"Nothing. It was surely strange how such a thing could have happened and not be found sometime. It is not an easy matter for a woman to disappear and all traces of her be lost."

Hester had not been present during this conversation. As Helen finished, her roommate came down the corridor and joined the two girls.

"Helen has been telling me the most thrilling tales from her family history. It is worth writing to make a story. Don't you know something, Hester? Didn't your family do some wonderful things?"

"No," replied Hester. "The Aldens settled down in one place and remained there. As Aunt Debby says, they fulfilled their duty to their church and to their neighbors, but nothing happened in their lives which was not prosaic."

"But your mother's family," persisted Erma. "Surely there must be something romantic on her side of the tree."

Hester smiled at the words. There was a little touch of sadness in her smile. She had never spoken to the girls of her people. They knew that she was an Alden. The name was well known in the central part of the State. They knew that an aunt had reared her. That was all the knowledge that came to them. When other girls talked together of what their parents and grandparents had done as children and repeated the old-time stories, which had been handed down to them as part of their family history, Hester Alden had only listened and had taken no part in the recital. Now, she would have evaded Erma's direct question, but Erma was not one who would permit her inquiries to go by the board. She repeated it. Hester answered slowly.

"When I was a year old I had neither father nor mother. My mother met a horrible death. Aunt Debby took me. She never could talk of my parents, so I know little of them. Aunt Debby is mother, father, sister, and brother to me."

"Oh, forgive me, I did not know. I would not have wounded you for the world."

Erma was on her feet. Impulsive, loving and quick to act, she put her hands on Hester's shoulders and touched her lips warmly and affectionately. "But you have friends. I want to be one, Hester. You know I've always liked you and I'd love you if you'd give me half a chance."

Hester, who responded quickly to affection, returned the embrace. "I'd love to have you for a friend. Aunt Debby is always first, for she is my friend, too, but you and Helen must be the next best."

The little flow of sentiment might have continued, had not Renee at that moment, appeared in the doorway.

"I'm awfully sorry to disturb you. But could you lend me your Solid Geometry, Helen? Did you get that original? Have you really? Isn't that lovely! Would you object to letting me look over it for a moment?"

Helen took the book from the study-table and drawing out an original, handed it to Renee who, sitting down, began a thorough study of the problem she could not solve for herself.

Barely was Renee disposed of than Josephine came in. She moved languidly. Her eyes were opened very wide, but instead of brilliance or alertness, they spoke of sentiment and dreaminess. Josephine had made a study of looking so. Soulful, she thought it to be; but the girls called it by another name not so complimentary and rallied her good-naturedly about it.

Renee was quick, in action and thought. Josephine's slowness annoyed her. Now, she took her eyes from the paper which she had been studying on, and cried brusquely, "If someone would only set a fire under you, you'd get somewhere sooner, Jo. Why don't you move, when you move."

Jo was not annoyed. She moved not a whit faster. Gliding in, she seated herself on a s.h.i.+rt-waist box and a.s.sumed a pose of figure which she believed to be artistic. She showed no annoyance at Renee's speech. She smiled sweetly and serenely. No matter what was said to her, or done in her presence, that smile came to her. Her placidity was exceedingly annoying to this set of girls. "If Jo was not always so sugary sweet,"

was the general complaint. "If she would not always agree to everything.

If only now and then she would express an opinion, one would know at least that she had formed one." These were the only complaints ever made against her.

"Has something been troubling you?" she asked Helen. "You appear quite disturbed."

"I am. I lost a pin." Helen told how she had placed it that evening she had last worn it, and how it had mysteriously disappeared. Both Jo and Renee had seen the heirloom, for Helen had worn it at intervals since she had entered the hall.

"I'd advertise for it. You might have dropped it in the hall somewhere.

Have Doctor Weldon announce it in chapel; and put a notice on the bulletin board in the main hall." It was Renee who made the practical suggestion.

"I'm sure I did not lose it outside this room. I am quite sure of that."

"About as sure as one can be of anything. I've noticed, however, that being sure is no proof."

"What a loss it must be to you!" cried Jo softly. "Of course, the money value is of little consideration. It is the memories which cling to it which make it precious. I know how you feel about such matters. You have so much sentiment. I know what trifles may mean to one. I always wear this little chain. I have worn it since I was three years old. I never could bear to part with it. It seems a tie to bind me to my childhood. I feel as though I could never grow old while I wear it. I shall never take it off."

Renee shrugged her shoulders. "I'm glad you don't have the same sentiment toward your collars. What a beautiful sentiment you might conjure up about a waist which some dear departed chum had embroidered for you; or perhaps she b.u.t.toned it up the back the first time you wore it and died immediately afterward. I really think the last would be most touching. Then you would feel that you could never unb.u.t.ton the b.u.t.tons which her dear hands had b.u.t.toned."

The irony in Renee's voice was strong. While she had been speaking, she arose and moved toward the door.

Hester's face had flushed. She feared that Josephine would be angry.

Erma, however, laughed merrily, and smiled and fluttered about like a gay b.u.t.terfly. She thought Renee's sarcasm was the finest wit in the world. If it had been directed toward herself, she would not have cared at all, and could conceive of no reason why Jo should be hurt.

Josephine raised her brows languidly and smiled sweetly. "Renee laughs at sentiment," she said. "What is it that Shakespeare says about jesting at scars because you never felt a wound?"

"If I ever do show wounds," cried Renee, "they will not be ones made by a tin soldier with a toy pistol. It will take a cannon ball to make me know that I've been touched."

She sailed out of the room, her head high and her heels coming down with some show of feeling. Erma burst into a fresh peal of laughter.

"Isn't Renee dear and doesn't she say the most brilliant things? I often wished I could be witty. All I can do is to laugh at the jokes which other girls make."

"Why wish to be witty?" asked Josephine. "You're so sweet and womanly and tender."

"Am I all that?" cried Erma and she laughed again. "I must go and tell Mame. She has known me for years and has never suspected that I am all that."

She hurried away. Jo yet lingered.

"I had a letter from Cousin Rob Vail," said Helen to Hester. "He is coming down Sat.u.r.day morning in the touring-car with Aunt Harriet and you and I are invited to take a ride and then have dinner down in the city. Aunt Harriet is disappointed that she has never been able to meet you. So be prepared to meet the sweetest woman in the world."

"Mrs. Vail is so sweet!" cried Jo. "I never look at her but there comes to my mind the picture of the 'Mater Dolorosa,' she's so sad and pensive."

"She looks sad," said Helen, "but I never knew livelier company. One cannot be dull with her. She has a sorrow which pa.s.ses comprehension, yet, she never worries another with it. She has trained herself to take an interest in others."