Edith Dunton - Betty Wales, Freshman

Just as the dinner-bell rang, Betty appeared, looking rather tired and pale. “Nan’s gone,” she announced. “She found she couldn’t make connections except by leaving at half past five, so she met me down at the college. And just at the last minute she gave me the money to buy a chafing-dish. Wasn’t that lovely? I know I should have cried and made a goose of myself, but after tha–I beg your pardon–I haven’t any sense.” She stopped in confusion.

But Helen only laughed. “Go on,” she said. “I don’t mind now. I don’t believe I’m going to be homesick any more, and if I am I’ll do my best not to cry.”

How the rest of that first week flew! Next day the freshman class list was read, and fortunately it included all the girls at Mrs. Chapin’s. Then there were electives to choose, complicated schedules to see through, first recitations to find, books to buy or rent, rooms to arrange, and all sorts of bewildering odds and ends to attend to. Saturday came before any one was ready for it, bringing in its wake the freshman frolic, a jolly, informal dance in the gymnasium, at which the whole college appears, tagged with its name, and tries to get accustomed to the size of the entering class, preparatory to becoming acquainted with parts of it later on. To Betty’s great delight Dorothy King met her in the hall of the Administration Building the day before and asked permission to take her to the frolic. At the gymnasium Miss King turned her over to a bewildering succession of partners, who asked her the stereotyped questions about liking college, having a pleasant boarding-place, and so on, tried more or less effectively to lead her through the crowd to the rather erratic music of one piano, and assured her that the freshman frolic was not at all like the other college dances. They all seemed very pleasant, but Betty felt sure she should never know them again. Nevertheless she enjoyed it all immensely and was almost sorry when the frolic was over and they adjourned to Dorothy’s pretty single room in the Hilton House, where a few other upper-class girls had been invited to bring their freshmen for refreshments.

“Wasn’t it fun?” said Betty to a fluffy-haired, dainty little girl who sat next her on Dorothy’s couch.

“I don’t think I should call it exactly fun,” said the girl critically.

“Oh, I like meeting new people, and getting into a crowd of girls, and trying to dance with them,” explained Betty.

“Yes, I liked it too,” said the girl. She had an odd trick of lingering over the word she wished to distinguish. “I liked it because it was so queer. Everything’s queer here, particularly roommates. Do you have one?”

Betty nodded. “Well, mine never made up her bed in her life before, and first she thought she couldn’t, but her mother told her to take hold and see what a Madison could do with a bed–they’re awfully proud of their old family–so she did; but it looks dreadfully messy yet, and it makes her late for chapel every single morning. Is yours anything like that?”

Betty laughed. “Oh, no,” she said. “She’s very orderly. Won’t you come and see us?”

The little freshman promised. By that time the “plowed field” was ready–an obliging friend had stayed at home from the frolic to give it an early start–and they ate the creamy brown squares of candy with a marshmallow stuffed into each, and praised the cook and her wares until a bell rang and everybody jumped up and began saying good-bye at once except Betty, who had to be enlightened by the campus girls as to the dire meaning of the twenty-minutes-to-ten bell.

“Don’t you keep the ten o’clock rule?” asked the fluffy-haired freshman curiously.

“Oh, yes,” said Betty. “Why, we couldn’t come to college if we didn’t, could we?” And she wondered why some of the girls laughed.

“I’ve had a beautiful time,” she said, when Miss King, who had come part way home with her, explained that she must turn back. “I hope that when I’m a junior I can do half as much for some little freshman as you have for me.”

“That’s a nice way to put it, Miss Wales,” said Dorothy. “But don’t wait till you’re a junior to begin.”

As Betty ran home, she reflected that she had not seen Helen dancing that evening. “Oh, Helen,” she called, as she dashed into the room, “wasn’t it fun? How many minutes before our light goes out? Do you know how to dance?”

Helen hesitated. “I–well–I know how, but I can’t do it in a crowd. It’s ten minutes of ten.”

“Teach you before the sophomore reception,” said Betty laconically, throwing a slipper into the closet with one hand and pulling out hairpins with the other. “What a pity that to-morrow’s Sunday. We shall have to wait a whole day to begin.”

The next morning Helen had gone for a walk with Katherine, and Betty was dressing for church, when Eleanor Watson knocked at the door. She looked prettier than ever in her long silk kimono, with its ruffles of soft lace and the great knot of pink ribbon at her throat.

“So you’re going to church too,” she said, dropping down among Betty’s pillows. “I was hoping you’d stay and talk to me. Did you enjoy your frolic?”

“Yes, didn’t you?” inquired Betty.

“I didn’t go,” returned Eleanor shortly.

“Oh, why not?” asked Betty so seriously that Eleanor laughed.

“Because the girl who asked me first was ill; and I wouldn’t tag along with the little Brooks and the Riches and your fascinating roommate. Now don’t say ‘why not?’ again, or I may hurt your feelings. Do you really like Miss Brooks?”

Betty hesitated. As a matter of fact she liked Mary Brooks very much, but she also admired Eleanor Watson and coveted her approval. “I like her well enough,” she said slowly, and disappeared into the closet to get something she did not want and change the subject.

Eleanor laughed. “You’re so polite,” she said. “I wish I were. That is, I wish I could make people think I was, without my taking the trouble. Don’t go to church.”

“Helen and Katherine are coming back for me. You’d better go with us,” urged Betty.

“Now that Kankakee person – ” began Eleanor. The door opened suddenly and Katherine and Helen came in. Katherine, who had heard Eleanor’s last remark, flushed but said nothing. Eleanor rose deliberately, smoothed the pillows she had been lying on, and walked slowly off, remarking over her shoulder, “In common politeness, knock before you come in.”

“Or you may hear what I think of you,” added Katherine wickedly, as Eleanor shut the door.

Helen looked perplexed. “Should I, Betty?” she asked, “when it’s my own room.”

“It’s nicer,” said Betty. “Nan and I do. How do you like our room, Katherine?”

“It’s a beaut,” said Katherine, taking the hint promptly. “I don’t see how you ever fixed your desks and couches, and left so much space in the middle. Our room is like the aisle in a Chicago theatre. That Japanese screen is a peach and the water-color over your desk is another. Did you buy back the chafing-dish?”

Betty laughed. She had amused the house by getting up before breakfast on the day after Nan left, in her haste to buy a chafing-dish. In the afternoon Rachel had suggested that a teakettle was really more essential to a college establishment, and they had gone down together to change it. But then had come Miss King’s invitation to eat “plowed field” after the frolic; and the chafing-dish, appearing once more the be-all and end-all of existence, had finally replaced the teakettle.

“But we’re going to have both,” ventured Helen shyly.

“Oh yes,” broke in Betty. “Isn’t it fine of Helen to get it and make our tea-table so complete?” As a matter of fact Betty much preferred that the tea-table should be all her own; but Helen was so delighted with the idea of having a part in it, and so sure that she wanted a teakettle more than pillows for her couch, that Betty resolved not to mind the bare-looking bed, which marred the cozy effect of the room, and above all never to let Helen guess how she felt about the tea-table. “But next year you better believe I’m hoping for a single room,” she confided to the little green lizard who sat on her inkstand and ogled her while she worked.