Part 2 (1/2)
”It'd be acting a lie,” broke in Nancy.
”Oh, not exactly, Nancy, for you really are Anne Leavitt and, anyway, it's just as though you were my other half. Way back I know we are related. If you don't love me well enough to help me out now--well, I'm disappointed. I'll never forget it!”
Poor Nancy, mindful of the long separation that lay before her and her friend, cried out in protest.
”Oh, Anne, _don't_ say that!”
Claire, her eyes brilliant with excitement, chimed in:
”Nancy, it's a hope-to-die adventure. Maybe you could make up no end of stories and plays out of the things that happen up there! And, anyway, you can finish the 'Child' and come to Merrycliffe that much sooner!”
Claire had advanced the most appealing argument. North Hero Island certainly sounded more inspiring than a stuffy flat in Harlem with six small Finnegans one floor below. And it was an adventure. Anne hastened to take advantage of the yielding she saw in Nancy's face.
”You can stay here with me until I have to go to New York, and we can look up trains and I can tell you all about my forefathers, though I really don't know a single thing. But she won't expect you to know--don't you remember she wrote that she regretted my being brought up without knowing the home of my forefathers. And if you just act as though you wanted more than anything else in the world to learn all about the Leavitts, she'll just love it and she'll tell you everything you _have_ to know!”
”It's the most _thrilling_ romance,” sighed Claire, enviously.
”Sounds more to _me_ like a conspiracy, and can't they put people in jail for doing things like that?” demanded Nancy.
”Oh, Nancy, you're _so_ literal--as if she would, way up there on an island next to nowhere! And anyway, think of the boys who perjured themselves to get into the service. Wasn't that justified?”
Nancy, being in an unpleasant mood, started to ask what _that_ had to do with _her_ pretending to be an Anne Leavitt who she wasn't, when Big Anne went on in a hurt tone:
”Well, we won't talk about it any more! I'll have to give up going to Russia and my whole life will be spoiled. And I _am_ disappointed--I thought our friends.h.i.+p meant something to you, Nancy.”
”_Anne_! There isn't a _thing_ I wouldn't do for you! You're next dearest to Dad. For you I'll go to--Freedom or any old place. I'll do my best to be you to the dot and I'll pay homage to your forefathers and will ask not a penny of the legacy--if you get it! It shall all be for the cause!”
Anne read no irony in her tone. Her dignity flown, she caught her friend in a strangling hug. ”Oh, Nancy, you _darling_, will you? I'll never forget it! We'll write to her right away--or you will. From this _very_ minute you are Anne Leavitt!”
”I wish I could go, too,” put in Claire. ”Perhaps I can coax Barry to motor up that way.”
”Don't you _dare_!” cried Nancy in consternation. ”It would spoil it all. I'll write to you every day every thing that happens. Goodness, if I'm as scared when I face your Aunt Sa-something as I am right now when I think about it, she'll know at a glance that I'm just an everyday Leavitt and not the child of her forefathers!”
”Hark!” Claire lifted a silencing finger. ”The seniors are singing.”
The lines they loved drifted to them.
”Lift the chorus, speed it onward, Loud her praises tell!”
”Let's join them.” Suddenly Claire caught a hand of each. ”_Girls_, think of it--what it _means_--it's the last time--_it's all over_!”
Her pretty face was tragic.
Big Anne, with a vision of Russia in her heart, set her lips resolutely.
”Don't look _back_--look _ahead_!” she cried, grandly.
But in Nancy's mind as, her arms linked with her chums', she hurried off to join the other Seniors in their last sing, the troubling question echoed: ”To what?”
CHAPTER II