CHAPTER XIII.
GETTING SETTLED.
Both Ruby and Maude felt very shy when they went downstairs and saw so many girls whom they did not know at all. They were very glad that among all those strange girls there was at least one whom they each knew.
"Was n't it the funniest thing that we should happen to come to the same boarding-school?" whispered Maude, as she took Ruby's hand and walked up and down the porch, while the scholars who had already come and felt very much at home, looked at them half curiously and half shyly, no doubt wondering whether they would be pleasant schoolmates or not.
Aunt Emma found that Ruby was quite contented to stay with Maude, so she went back upstairs, where she still had some little things to do, and Mrs. Birkenbaum finished unpacking Maude's things, for she had to go away that afternoon, and wanted to unpack Maude's trunk before she left.
Ruby and Maude walked up and down the porch for a time and then they went down upon the lawn. There was a large lawn in front of the house, where the girls usually played. In one corner of it there was a croquet set, and as this was something new to Ruby, she looked at the hoops with a great deal of interest, while Maude, who had a set at home explained the game to her.
"I will show you how to play it, and we will play together sometimes," Maude said.
There was plenty of room to play tag, and puss in the corner, and Ruby thought the trees grew in just the right places for that game. She wondered if there had been a school there when they were planted, and if Miss Chapman had planted them so that they would be nice for puss in the corner.
The house was quite large, and when Ruby and Maude walked around the lawn towards the back of the house, they found the schoolhouse, which was connected with the rest of the house by a long covered passage-way, so that the girls could go backward and forward in wet weather without getting wet.
The school-room was not open, but the children looked through the window, and saw the teacher's desk at one end, blackboards hung upon the walls, and long rows of desks and seats for the scholars.
On the other side of the school-room was the garden, with vegetables and flowers, and some pear-trees that were laden with fruit.
"Those pears look nice, don't they?" said Maude. "I wonder if they will let us have some. Perhaps Miss Chapman keeps them all for herself. We will have some anyway, won't we, Ruby. Well, I guess we have seen everything now. I think I will go upstairs and see if mamma has finished unpacking my trunk."
Ruby was quite willing to go into the house, for she was sure that by this time Aunt Emma would have emptied her trunk, and she might write her letter home.
"I was just coning to look for you, Ruby dear," said Aunt Emma, as her little niece opened the door. "You can write to your mamma now, if you like, and you will just have time to write a nice long letter before it is supper-time."
Ruby untied the ribbon about her neck, took the little key off, and opened the desk, with a feeling of pride. She was quite sure that there could not be a prettier desk in all the world than this one which Orpah had given her, and she was very anxious to show it to Maude, and surprise her with its beauty.
"What shall I write my letter on first, Aunt Emma?" she asked.
"Here is a piece of paper and a pencil you can use, and then you can copy it afterwards," said Aunt Emma; so Ruby sat down at a little table by the window, and wrote to her mother.
RUBY WRITING A LETTER HOME.
When she had finished her letter and Aunt Emma had looked it over, and corrected the few mistakes in spelling that she found, Ruby opened the desk, and putting it upon the table, took out some of her pink paper, which she thought was the prettiest, and carefully copied the letter.
"This ought to be a very nice letter, written on such a beautiful desk, with a silver pen-holder, ought n't it, Aunt Emma?" she asked.
"Yes, dear, and I am sure your mamma will think it is very nice," her aunt answered.
Ruby was very proud when she finished copying it without one single mistake. She did not usually have the patience to work so carefully but she felt as if such a desk deserved great care on the part of its owner.
Would you like to hear her letter? Here it is:
MY DEAR MAMMA AND PAPA,—I am writing this letter to you on a beautiful new desk that Orpah gave me. That was what was in the package she made me promise not to open. We had a very pleasant journey. There was a very kind old gentleman on the cars, who talked to me and told me stories, and he told the boy with a basket to let the little lady choose what she wanted, and I chose a big pear. I divided it with Aunt Emma and the old gentleman. When I was sleepy I put my head down on his shoulder the way his little grand-daughter does, and I went to sleep and I slept ever so long, though I thought it was only a little while. It is nice to ride in the cars, but it takes a long time. I like this school. I like Miss Chapman. She has white hair like grandma. Her eyes are blue. I shall be good, for I like her very much. But I shall be good anyway, because I promised you. I do want to see you, mamma, and papa, too. Aunt Emma has unpacked my trunk, and my things are all put away. Maude Birkenbaum is here. She was at the station at the same time I was, and we walked up together. I mean to be good. Her mother said she hoped I would be a help to Maude, and I mean to try to be good, instead of doing things she wants me to do. I love you a whole heartful, mamma and papa. Please write me a long letter soon. I hope you will soon be well again, mamma. I shall seal this letter with my new sealing wax, and you must pretend it is a kiss.
Your loving RUBY.
Ruby was so impatient to use her new sealing-wax outfit that she found it very hard work to finish her letter carefully, and write the last words just as well as she had written the first one.
"Do you think 'Ruby' looks as well as 'My dear Mamma and Papa'?" she asked Aunt Emma, carrying the paper over to her.
That was Ruby's test whether she had been careful in writing a letter, to look and see whether the last words were as carefully written as the first ones. Sometimes, if she had not been very careful, one would not think that the same little girl had written all the letter. The first few lines would be so very neat and carefully written, and the last ones would be straggly, and of different heights and wandering all across the pages.
But this time Ruby had been very careful indeed. She had left just the same margin all the way down the left-hand side of her page, and she had been careful in dividing her words, so when Aunt Emma had looked it all over very carefully, she could say that it was just as nice as Ruby could possibly have written.
Then Ruby folded it and put it into one of her new envelopes; and then came the most exciting part of all. Ruby had never been very fond of letter-writing before, but she thought she would be perfectly willing to write a letter every day, if she might always seal them up with wax.
She put the little pond-lily candlestick out upon the table, on a folded piece of paper, which Aunt Emma told her she had better put under it lest the melted wax should drop upon the table-cloth, and then she took out her little box of colored tapers, and tried to decide which one she should use first.
She decided upon the pink one, because that matched the color of the paper she had been using; and so she took out a pink taper, and set it in the candlestick. It fitted very snugly, so there was no danger of its falling out.
Aunt Emma showed her how to open the little silver match-box that Ruby had not discovered before in the outfit, and she lighted the taper, and then held a stick of green sealing-wax in the flame.
When the end had grown quite soft in the heat, Ruby watched it carefully, and let the big drop at the end fall just at the right time, and in just the right place upon her envelope. Then she pressed the seal down upon it, and you can guess how proud she was when she saw her initial in the wax.
"Won't mamma be surprised when she gets this letter?" she asked gleefully. "She will wonder where I got the wax, and I am sure she will hardly believe that I made such a nice seal the very first time I ever used it."
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[Transcriber's note: page 146 missing from book]
her, which made a very great difference; and then she was very much interested in listening to the talk of the girls who had been there before, as they crowded about Aunt Emma and told her of what they had been doing during their vacation.
Maude was not at all pleased when she found that no one paid any particular attention to her, and she sat by herself with a very discontented look upon her face.
One of the girls came up to her after a time, and asked her if she would like to take part in a game, but Maude refused, sullenly, and after that no one else spoke to her.
"I shall go home just as soon as mamma can come and get me," she said to herself. "I don't like this place one single bit. No one pays a bit of attention to me, and my dress is ever so much nicer than any one else's. I think Ruby might come and sit by me, instead of staying with her aunt, so I do."
But Ruby was very happy where she was. She had not forgotten Maude, and when they had first gone into the sitting-room, she had invited Maude to come and sit beside her; but as Maude had refused, wishing Ruby to come over to her, she had concluded that Maude wished to be by herself, and was listening to the talk going on about her, without thinking any more about Maude.
At eight o'clock all the girls went up to bed, and Miss Chapman told them that in half an hour a bell would be rung, and that then they must put their lights out, and not talk any more to one another that night.
Some of the girls who were tired had gone to bed earlier, but most of the scholars had stayed downstairs until that hour. The next day would be the first day of regular school, and Miss Chapman told them that she hoped they would all sleep well so as to be fresh for their studies in the morning.
When Ruby was in her room, she realized for the first time with all her heart how much happier she was than those girls who had come quite alone. If she had not Aunt Emma she did not know what she should have done, she should have been so lonely. As it was, all her chatter stopped as she began to get undressed, and though Aunt Emma talked on about everything that she thought would interest her little niece, yet Ruby's answers grew more and more infrequent, and Aunt Emma guessed that she was thinking about home, and the dear ones there from whom she had never been separated so long before.
Ruby was really a brave little girl, and when she felt the lump swelling in her throat again she kept swallowing it back, and trying to think only of how pleased her papa would be when he should hear that she had been good and had not cried to come home; but when at last she knelt down to say her prayers in her little white night gown, the tears would come.
"I want mamma, oh, I want mamma," she sobbed.
Aunt Emma took her up tenderly in her arms, and kissed and comforted the little girl as tenderly as she could; but no one could take the place of mother, and though Ruby tried to stop crying, the tears came fast and thick.
"You may think I am not trying to be brave, Aunt Emma," said Ruby, through her sobs; "but I am trying, I truly am, but it does just seem as if I should die if I could n't see my mamma. Oh, if I was only home again. Can't I possibly go home to-morrow, Aunt Emma? Do say yes, or I can't live all night."
"There, dear, don't cry so hard," said Aunt Emma, wiping away her tears. "You will feel better to-morrow, Ruby darling. You will be so busy getting your lessons that you will not have time to think about anything else, and then when night comes again, you will remember that you have come away with me so that your dear mamma can get well and strong again, and the braver you are, the sooner she will improve. You had forgotten that, had n't you, dear? You know you are helping to make her well here at school. I know you can't help crying some. I shall not think you are not brave because you do, but I know you are going to stop very soon and cuddle up and go to sleep, and wake up as happy as a little bird."
Ruby wiped away her tears after a time, and Aunt Emma went to bed with her, that the little girl might feel loving arms about her, and not remember how far she was away from home and from her mother and father.