11. The Mysterious Guest
“I think you ought to preside, Kit,” Virginia said as she arranged the table. “It’s your party, and you ought to serve.”
“Takes too much concentration,” Kit returned. “Anne’ll help you. I want to have my mind perfectly clear to manage the thing. You see, Jeannette doesn’t know a thing about it yet, and there’s no knowing how she’ll take it. Wouldn’t it be funny if she got proud and haughty and marched away from our Founders’ Tea?”
“I don’t think you ought to spring it until after we’ve had refreshments. Food has such a mellowing effect on people. It’s all a question of tact, though. If I were you, I’d talk to them in an intimate sort of way instead of lingering too much on the historic value. Better straighten Malcolm, over there. He looks kind of topply.”
Kit regarded the framed steel engraving of Malcolm Douglas almost fondly. It occupied a prominent spot specially cleared for it in the middle of the wall.
Backed by Della’s approval and interest, Kit had called at several homes where the descendants of other founders lived, and the results were gratifying. Mrs. Peter Bradbury had contributed two Indian blankets and a hunting bag, besides an old pair of saddle bags used by an early missionary bishop in the Northwest. From the cabinet in the Dean’s room had come mostly records, old documents carefully framed, and several letters written by the founders themselves.
“Golly,” Kit said as she gave a last touch to her exhibit, “of course these are important, but I like the Indian and hunting things best. I wish I could run away with that double pair of buffalo horns that belonged to Dr. Gleason’s granduncle or somebody. I like them better than anything.”
A quick rap came on the door, and before Virginia could even call “come in” Peggy entered with her usual galaxy behind her, Amy, Georgia, and a newcomer from Iowa, Henrietta Jenkins.
“Tony Conyers sent word she’d be ready in five minutes,” said Georgia. “She’s got a lot of the girls in there with her. Ginny, I think this is a perfectly stupendous idea of yours.”
“’Tisn’t mine,” answered Virginia, “it’s Kit’s. This is her party. Her coming-out party at Hope.”
“Oh, are you the founder’s granddaughter?” Amy inquired, her eyes opening wide.
“No, I’m not,” replied Kit. “I wish this minute I could tell you about my ancestors. I’ve got some beauts. Peggy, don’t sit on the almonds. They’re right behind you in that glass dish.”
The room filled up rapidly with people. Kit declared after she had been the rounds four times that she felt exactly like the lecturer in a museum, telling the history of the relics over and over again. Nobody but Anne knew how anxious she was as the minutes slipped by and no Jeannette appeared. It would never do to have a climax happen without the surprise of her presence to carry it off. The refreshments had all been served, and the clock on top of the bookshelves showed that it was five, when Virginia called; “You’d better start in on your Founders’ talk, Kit. We’ve only got about half an hour.”
There was a baffled look in Kit’s eyes, as she picked up the challenge and rose from her chair. Virginia must know perfectly well how untimely it was to start to spring the surprise while there was a running chance of Jeannette appearing. Still there was a hush, and the girls faced her expectantly.
“As you all know,” began Kit, “the old bronze tablet in the lower hall carries names on its roll of honor which not only uphold the glory of Hope College, but also of the entire town of Delphi, of the entire state, I may say of Wisconsin.
“There are few of us here today, if any,” continued Kit slowly, one eye watching the concrete walk across the campus from the nearest window, “who can boast of a Hope founder in her family.”
“I can, almost,” interrupted Tony, “my sister Marie was engaged for a little while to Bernard Giron. If she had only married him, we would have had a ‘Founder’ in the family.”
“Tony,” said Kit, severely, “I am dealing with facts, not prospects, and you ought not reveal any family secrets, either. I say it is a great honor to be a direct descendant of a ‘Founder,’ and we have one in our class. A girl, too modest to take advantage of her grandfather’s record.” She paused impressively, but with a quickening gleam in her eyes, as there suddenly came in view a hurrying figure in a gray suit on the campus walk. It was Jeannette herself, late, but in time to create the desired sensation.
Kit drew a deep breath, and plunged back to her subject, considering exactly the time it would take for the belated guest to reach the study.
“Since all the girls here belong to this dormitory, it seems appropriate that the founder whose memory we honor should be Malcolm Douglas. His portrait hangs on the wall, evidently taken from an old likeness.” Oh, how she wished the family could hear her now! “There is no more adventurous or thrilling career in the annals of historic Delphi than that of the illustrious Scotchman. Making his way through the perils of the wilderness, he came from Quebec with a party of fur traders and pioneer explorers.”
“Don’t hit too far back, Kit,” interrupted Peggy, alertly. “If he was a founder, you can’t have him trotting over wilderness trails with Marquette and Lasalle, you know.”
“Nevertheless,” responded Kit, ignoring her, “he is one of the founders of this college. He came here in his early twenties, and married Lucia, the daughter of Captain Peter Morton. Their daughter was Mary, and, girls, she was the mother of one of our classmates, the very same Mary who went through Hope and graduated with high honors. You’ll find her initials carved in Number 10 across the hall, and her portrait—the only one I could find—is in this graduating group.”
The girls all crowded forward to look at the group photograph which Kit held out to them, just as a knock came at the door. For one dramatic instant Kit held the knob, her back against the door as she announced in almost a whisper, “The granddaughter of Malcolm Douglas.”
The girls leaned forward, eagerly, every eye fixed upon the door. As Kit said later to Anne, “Goodness knows who they expected to see, but I almost felt as though I had promised them a two-headed man, and then had sprung Jeannette. Wasn’t she marvelous, Anne? The way she stood the introduction and the shock of finding herself the guest of honor. As I looked at her, I thought to myself, you may be Douglas, and you may be Morton, fine old Scotch and English stock, but if it wasn’t for the dash of debonair Flambeau in you too, you could never carry this off the way you’re doing.”
Jeannette was not the only person present who had to fall back on inherent caste for their manners of the moment, but Tony was the only one that gave an audible gasp. Even Peggy and Georgia smiled, and greeted the Founder’s granddaughter in the proper spirit.
She was dressed in a plain gray suit, but Kit gloried in the way she took her place beside Virginia at the table, and answered the questions of the girls with laughing ease.
“Of course,” she said, with the little slight accent she seemed to have caught from her father and old Grandmother Flambeau, “I thought everyone in Delphi knew. For myself, I am proud of him, and of all my mother’s people, but I am also proud of being a Flambeau. You girls do not know perhaps that some of my father’s people helped to found Fort Dearborn, and they were very brave and courageous voyagers in the early days of New France.”
Peggy really rose to the occasion remarkably, Kit thought. Probably the most jealously guarded membership in the prep classes was that of the Portia Club, and yet, before the tea was over, she had invited Jeannette to attend the next meeting and be proposed for membership.
“We’re not going to try a whole play at first, just famous scenes, and I know you’d fit in somewhere and enjoy it. Don’t you want to, Jeannette?”
Jeannette shrugged her shoulders, and said, “I shall be glad to help always, if you wish to make me one of you.”
“What do you think of that?” Anne said on the way home. “Kit, you certainly have discovered a flower that was born to blush unseen.”
“It will take her out of her shell, anyway,” Kit replied happily. “And I do think the girls came up to the mark splendidly. How I’d like to hear what they’re saying about us now, behind our backs, but they acted their parts nobly when I swung that door open, and there stood, just Jeannette!”