Part 11 (1/2)
The junior bent nearer to speak in lower tones; but Lila and I could not help hearing. ”Mary, something is wrong with us too,” she whispered. ”Did you know that to-day at our mock election some of the soph.o.m.ores pretended to be corrupt voters and wardheelers? They intimidated voters, challenged registrations, played at buying votes, tried to stuff the ballot-boxes. There was a most disgraceful scrimmage! To turn such crimes into a joke! How could they? How could we?”
Miss Benton straightened herself with a movement that was sorrowful and angry and discouraged all at once. She drew a deep breath.
”I will tell you what is wrong with us as well as with the entire country. Our ideal of honesty is wrong. With us here at college the trouble is in little things; with the world of business and politics the evil is in great matters too. But the principle is the same. We are not honest. We condemn graft in public office. Is it not also graft when a student helps herself to examination foolscap and takes it for private use? Is the girl who carries away sugar from the table any better than the government employee who misappropriates funds or supplies in his charge? We cry out in horror at revelations of bribery. Ah, but in our cla.s.s elections do we vote for the candidate who will best fill the office, or for our friends? I have known a girl who desired to be president of the Athletic a.s.sociation to bargain away her influence to another who was running for an editors.h.i.+p.”
”And some of us travel on pa.s.ses which are made out in other names.”
Miss Benton did not hear. ”We exclaim--we point our fingers--we groan over the trickery of officials, scandals, bribery, treachery, lawlessness. And yet we--is it honest to bluff in recitations--to lay claim to knowledge which we do not possess? Is it honest to injure a library book and not pay for the damage? Is it honest to neglect to return borrowed property? Some of us rob the maids of strength by obliging them to work overtime in waiting on us at the table. Our lack of punctuality steals valuable time from tutors and teachers and each other.
We cheat the faculty by slighting our opportunities and thus making their life work of inferior quality to that which they have a right to expect.
By heedless exaggeration we may murder a reputation--mutilate an existence. We wrong each other by being less than our best. We are unscrupulous about breaking promises. Down town this afternoon at the corner of Main and Market Streets I saw a freshman waiting in the cold.
She was walking to and fro to get warm. Her teeth chattered,--she was crying from nervous suspense. When I spoke to her and advised her to return to college before dark, she shook her head, and said no, somebody had promised to meet her, and she had to stay. Now that girl, whoever it was, who broke that engagement, is responsible----”
I leaned forward and clutched Miss Benton's shoulder.
”She hasn't come back yet,” I cried; ”do you think she is there still? I forgot--I thought it didn't matter. I didn't mean to--”
Miss Benton turned around her head to look up at me, and the others near us looked too, and down at the foot of the stairs the crowd packed in front of the bulletin board sort of quieted for a minute and seemed to be listening and watching us. And up on the wall over their heads the big clock went tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock, and its long pendulum swung to and fro.
Then swish, swish, swish, the lady princ.i.p.al came hurrying through the reception hall beyond, with her silk skirts rustling, and her face quite pale. And the girls turned their heads toward her. She raised her hand and said in her soft voice: ”Are Miss Martha Reed's roommates here?”
And then some more girls with their hats and coats on came running up the steps from the vestibule. The crowd was buzzing like everything when Lila and I pushed our way through to tell Mrs. Howard we were there. We caught sc.r.a.ps of sentences flying hither and thither.
”Run over?”
”Lying in the road----”
”Who found her?”
”Yes, right there in the loneliest part.”
”Such a timid little thing----”
”Frightened and fell maybe----”
”Queer she didn't take the car.”
”Is she dead?”
Lila pushed ahead, thrusting the girls right and left from her path. I couldn't see her face, but her shoulders kept pumping up and down as if she were smothering. You know she's more sensitive than I am, and I felt badly enough.
Mrs. Howard took her hand and said, ”Miss Reed wishes to see you both and leave a message.”
Of course such a speech would make anybody think she was dying. I rubbed my sleeve across my eyes and shut my teeth together and swallowed once, for the other girls around were gazing after us. Lila walked on with her head up. I couldn't see anything but the line of her cheek, and that looked sort of cold and stony. We followed on over the thick rugs into the second reception room. There sitting in a big chair, leaning back against a cus.h.i.+on kind of limp and pale but not dead at all--there was Martha.
”Did you get the money?” she asked.
Lila didn't answer. She just dropped on her knees and hid her face against Martha's dress.