5. Farewell Party
That was the end of August. Becky approved of the plan, and said no doubt the fire down at Woodhow had been a good thing after all.
“You were all of you settling down into a rut before it happened, and the old place needed a thorough going over anyhow. You know you couldn’t have afforded it, Tom, if it hadn’t been for the fire insurance money coming in so handy. Now, you’ll all move back the first part of the winter, with the new furnace set up, and no cracks for the wind to whistle through. Jean will be here and I don’t think Kit’s a bit too young to be going off alone. Land alive, Margaret, you ought to be so thankful that you’ve got children with any get-up to them in this day and age. The Judge and I were saying just the other night it seems as if most of the young people up around here haven’t got any pluck or initiative at all. They’re born to feel that they’re heirs of grace, and most of them are sure of having a farm or wood lot in their own right, sooner or later.”
So the trunk stood open most of the time, and Kit prepared for her trip to Delphi. Mr. Craig was inclined to take it as rather a good joke on the Dean, but Mrs. Craig could not get over a certain little feeling of conscience in the matter. The rest of the family pinned its faith on Kit’s persuasive adaptability.
Tommy was a little disappointed at first not to be going, but then he thought of leaving Jack behind. He knew that Jack would be sure to get into trouble if he weren’t there to look after him and he was extremely proud of his responsibility. Doris dreaded going back to school without Kit.
“Lucy Peckham will go over with you,” Kit told her cheerfully, “and just think of the wonderful letters you’ll have from me, Doris. Miss Cogswell says that I always shine best when I’m writing, and I’ll tell you all the news of Hope College. By the way, Dad told me last night that he’s pretty sure in those little family colleges they run a prep department, which takes in the last two years of high school. Perhaps I could persuade them that the great-grandniece of Barton Cato would be a deserving object of their consideration. Don’t forget to pack my skates, Doris. I let you have them last, and they’re hanging in your closet.”
Becky decided to have a farewell party, two nights before Kit left, and the girls and Tommy were delighted. Any party launched by Becky promised novelty and excitement.
They danced in the living room to the tune of the records on the phonograph. In the library, some of the younger ones were playing forfeits. Abby Tucker was giving out forfeits, sitting blindfolded on a chair.
It happened that Doris’s little turquoise for-get-me-not ring was the particular forfeit dangling over Abby’s head, when Billie stuck his head in at the open window, and Abby lifted her chin at the sound of his voice.
“She must catch Billie Ellis, and bring him back to kneel at my feet, and hand over his forfeit.”
Billie had evaded this, whirling about in the driveway and speeding down the long lane with Doris in fast pursuit. Overhead the mulberry trees met in a leafy arcade, and out of the hazel thicket a whippoorwill called, flying low down the lane after the two darting forms, as if it were trying to find out what the excitement was about at that time of night. At the turn of the lane there were three apple trees, early Shepherd Sweetings, and here Billie slipped down and lay breathing heavily, his hands hunting for windfalls in the tall grass. Doris passed him by, speeding the full length of the lane and bringing up at the end of the log run before the old mill.
“Billie Ellis, you come out of there,” she called. “I’ve got my shoes wet already chasing after you, and I’m not going to climb all over those old timbers hunting for you.”
Only the whippoorwill answered, calling now from a clump of elderberry bushes close by the water’s edge, and while she stood listening, there was the dull splash in the pond where some big bullfrog had taken alarm at her coming.
Billie gathered a goodly supply of apples, and stole after her in the shadows.
“Well, I’m not going to stay out here all night waiting for you,” Doris said, addressing the wide dark entrance to the mill, when all at once there came his voice, directly behind her shoulder.
“Why didn’t you try to catch me? I was resting back under the apple tree. Let’s sit down over the falls and eat some apples. If Abby’s waiting for me to kneel in front of her, she’ll wait all night. I’d like to see myself kneeling in front of a girl!”
The words had hardly left his lips, before Doris played an old-time schoolgirl trick on him. Catching him by his collar, she twirled him about with an odd twist until he knelt in front of her. Although Billie was older than she was, she had managed to catch him off guard. Billie shook himself ruefully when he rose.
“You always catch a guy when he’s not expecting anything,” he said.
“Do you good,” she retorted serenely. “Ever since you went away to school, you’ve had a high and mighty opinion of yourself. I hope you get over it. Aren’t these apples swell, though? Do you suppose they’ll mind very much if we stay just a few minutes? Don’t you love this old pond, Bill? Remember your flat-bottomed boat that always leaked when we used to go fishing in it. How I hated to take turns bailing it out.”
“Yeah. Gee, I wish I didn’t have to go back to school so soon.”
“Wouldn’t it be strange, Bill, if either of us were famous some day? I know you’re going to be somebody special. Maybe it will be in natural history.”
Billie laughed comfortably, perching himself just below her on the heavy timbers of the old sluice gate. “Grandfather says I have a great responsibility on my shoulders, because I’m the last of the Ellis family. He says there’s always been an Ellis in the State Legislature at Hartford, ever since there was a legislature, and just as soon as I’m old enough, he’s going to send me to law school. Gee, I wish he wouldn’t. Think of being shut up all day long in an office.”
Far down the lane they heard the others calling them and Doris sprang up, scattering apples as she did so.
“I’d forgotten all about the party,” she exclaimed. “Anyway, I’m glad we had a chance to talk. If I were you, I’d just read and study everything I could lay my hands on about insects and things, all the time I was in school, and then when the Judge sees that you’re in dead earnest about it, he’ll let you go on. I heard Dad say that Mr. Howard knew more about insects than any man he’d ever met, and that he was considered one of the coming experts in government work. Why, Bill, it’s just like a great scientist or doctor, who is able to discover a certain germ that can be used as a toxin, only you doctor plants and things.”
“I know,” Billie agreed enthusiastically. “There’s some man who discovered the cause of the wheat blight in the south and somebody else figuring out what was killing our chestnuts off. Doris, you’re a swell pal. If it wasn’t for you, I don’t know whether I’d ever have seen a chance to study what I want to, but you encourage me.”
Doris laughed and tagged him on the shoulder as she broke into a run. “You’re it. Don’t give anyone else the credit for starting you off in the way you know you ought to go. Just take a deep breath and race for it.”