The Girl Scouts of the Round Table 23

The Girl Scouts of the Round Table 23

The girls were not walking in drill formation and so were able to talk

with one another.

 

Louise Miller at this moment caught up with her two friends.

 

“Forgive me if I overheard a part of what you were saying, Tory,” she

began, “and forgive me again if I say that I don’t think you ought to

have thought or expressed such an opinion. Miss Frean is as fond of you

as she ever was. There is no question that she has more real affection

for you than any other of the Girl Scouts. The other thing you spoke of

is her own affair and I don’t feel you should have mentioned it.”

 

Louise had an abrupt, awkward fashion of speech that at times made her

family and friends angry.

 

Reproachfully Dorothy McClain shook her head at this moment.

 

Tory had a quick temper. She rarely made unfortunate remarks to other

persons, and having beautiful manners under most circumstances, perhaps

possessed the right to resent the lack of them in other people.

 

At this moment she flushed and bit her lips, but made no reply.

 

“Don’t you think, after all, that what Tory thinks and declares is her

own affair and not yours, Ouida? When did you decide to become the

censor of our manners?”

 

Dorothy’s tone held a slight dryness that was a sharper rebuke than

irritation, especially as she so rarely criticized the other girl, in

spite of their years of intimacy.

 

“Dorothy is right, I beg your pardon, Tory,” Louise faltered, a slow

color making her heavy features less attractive.

 

“The truth is I am so grateful for what Miss Frean has offered to do

for me that I am too ready to defend her where I have no shadow of

justification.”

 

“What is Memory going to do for you, Louise?” Tory inquired, having

fought and conquered her sudden gust of temper. She was learning more

self-control of late, when she had been tried in more than one fashion.

 

“Perhaps I should not have said what I did, but Dorothy and I have

grown so intimate over the problem of Kara’s strange attitude that

I tell her most things. I suppose Memory is helping you because she

thinks you are specially in need of her help. She has a way of passing

herself from one person to the other for this reason.”

 

Louise hesitated.

 

“I am one of the most awkward persons in the world, Tory, and you are

a dear not to be angry! I overheard what was not intended for me and

reproached you for it.

 

“Yes, I do need Miss Frean’s help. I have not had a happy winter,

things at home are becoming more and more difficult. It is just such

things as my having made that impolite speech to you without intending

or realizing how it might affect you, that makes my mother hopeless

concerning me. I thought after last summer I would improve.”

 

“Yes, Ouida, but come to the point. What is Miss Frean to do to help

reconcile you to life? Don’t you suppose I appreciate that things

have been specially hard for you at home? Perhaps you have not been

conscious of the fact, but I have seen less of you this winter than

since we were tiny girls. Even old Don noticed the fact and asked me

what was the matter,” Dorothy McClain protested.

 

For just a flashing moment Louise’s heavy features lightened and Tory

caught the look of affectionate devotion in the large, pale-gray eyes

with their queerly fringed lashes.

 

“No day has passed without my seeing you, Dorothy, when I have not

missed you and longed for you. But I knew you had Tory and the

excitement of Lance and Kara. Then mother did not wish me to see so

much of you,” Louise added with her fatal tactlessness.

 

At this it was Dorothy whose color flushed her clear, bright skin. Her

gray-blue eyes dropped.

 

“Sorry your mother thinks I am a bad influence! Perhaps I am! Only,

Tory, I trust Miss Victoria and Mr. Fenton will not reach the same

conclusion, or I should be deserted indeed.”

 

“Now you are hurting Ouida. Do let’s be sensible and stop arguing.

Louise did not mean that her mother considered you an undesirable

character, Dorothy. Perhaps she may be just a little jealous of

Louise’s affection for you. We are but mortals, all of us, even

mothers, I suppose, although Dorothy has no mother and I only a

stepmother.” Tory made an amusing grimace. “I would like to recall the

fact, Louise, that we still are in the dark with regard to you and

Memory Frean. Here, I may as well confess my jealousy. I don’t like

Louise being more of a favorite than I am, just as I resented Edith

Linder, I suppose.”

 

“Oh, it is nothing to create envy, hatred, malice or other

uncharitableness, Tory,” Louise answered, her serenity restored, and

smiling happily. “You would hate what Miss Frean and I are planning

to do. I am to be allowed to spend an afternoon each week with her

and go on with the studies of the outdoors that I found so thrilling

during our summer camp. We are going to study tree-ology and bug-ology

and stone-ology. Miss Frean insists she does not know about them, but

we can work outdoors together and she will have as much pleasure as

I feel. This cannot be true, but is a delightful idea. She does not

think it absurd for me to wish to become a naturalist. One may have it

for a pastime at least! Anyhow, I won’t do what I dislike all the time!”

 

Half an hour later one would scarcely have believed in the lessening of

the affection between Tory Drew and Memory Frean.

 

The Troop of Scouts and their Captain having halted at the House in the

Woods, Miss Frean had been persuaded to join them for the deeper walk

into the forest.

 

The beech woods were full of shadows and little shivery, sighing winds.

A few seared leaves that had clung all winter to the otherwise bare

branches rattled and shook like castanets. The younger beeches showed a

few uncurling leaves and ripples of light along the gray-brown bark of

their trunks.

 

On the ground under the trees were the first spring beauties and wild

pale violets.

 

The girls had scattered into groups and were investigating the favorite

haunts of the past summer.

 

Tory Drew led Miss Frean apart from the others and away from the woods

toward the shore of the small lake. Above rose the three pine hills.

 

The girl shrugged her shoulders with a faintly nervous gesture.

 

“I don’t like the woods to-day for some reason, Memory; they are kind

of ghosty and unfriendly. I like shining places filled with light and

color.”

 

The older woman shook her head.

 

“You are too impressionable, Tory dear! I wish you would not always

yield to your fancies.”

 

In response Tory smiled and dropped her head an instant against her

companion’s shoulder with one of her favorite gestures of affection.

 

“It is nice to hear you scold. I was just telling Dorothy and Louise

that you had ceased to care for me as you did in the beginning of our

friendship. I have not enjoyed it.”

 

“You are mistaken, Tory. I care for you perhaps more than ever. Your

winter has been more absorbed than you realize in your interest in the

strange circumstances concerning Kara and in your concern over Lance

McClain. Besides, I thought it best to realize I might be making a

mistake if I should become too devoted to one Girl Scout who might any

day go away to join her father and her friends and Westhaven see her no

more.”

 

There was a gravity in her companion’s voice that startled the girl,

who had been only half in earnest.

 

“Why, I am not going away, Memory! At least I have no idea of any such

possibility! Father has said nothing of it. And in any case I should

always come back to Westhaven. There is Uncle Richard and you and the

Girl Scouts! Why did you make such a suggestion? Do you remember that

when you presented me with my talisman you said I would learn to love

Westhaven with all my heart and that no matter where I might be I would

wander back now and then?”

 

Miss Frean nodded.

 

“Yes, Tory, I remember very well. I want to make a confession. I was

growing too fond of you to be content with an occasional sight of you,

perhaps with a year or years in between. So I came to my senses and

concluded I had no possible claim upon you except that we must always

be good friends and you must come to me freely at any time when I can

be of use.”

 

Tory’s face clouded.

 

“I see. So before anything happened you put me out of your life and

thought, just as you must have Uncle Richard many years ago.”

 

If Tory’s speech startled her companion it was as unexpected in her own

ears. What a fatal gift she had of speaking from the depth of her inner

thought!

 

“Tory!” Miss Frean exclaimed.

 

“I am sorry. I had not intended to be rude, only what I said must be

true. You are such a self-sufficient person, Memory Frean, and Uncle

Richard and I are not. We have found we are a good deal alike since we

have been living together, although I never believed I was in the least

like my mother’s people. I suppose you won’t tell me why you will not

allow Uncle Richard to be friends with you at present? He was enjoying

coming to see you, and he calls on very few people.”

 

The older woman hesitated, her blue eyes, ordinarily serene, looking

uncertain and troubled.

 

“You are an impetuous person, Tory, and will never fail in this world

for any lack of sincerity. After all, there is no reason why I should

not tell you what you ask! You may be annoyed with me, but I think I am

right.”

 

Tory sighed.