It was about the middle of the winter semestre that it happened, and of course it was Clara Arnold who knew about it first. Miss Arnold had liked “Miss Rose” from the beginning. She had taken a fancy to the hard-working woman, who had returned it with wondering admiration for the handsome, clever girl. And so Miss Arnold got into the habit of stopping for her occasionally to walk or drive, and it was when she went for her to go on one of those expeditions, that she discovered the trouble. She found “Miss Rose” sitting before her desk with a crumpled newspaper in her hand, and a dazed, hopeless expression on her face which cut the girl to the heart. Her things were scattered about the room, on the bed and chairs, an open trunk half-filled stood in one corner. Miss Arnold stared around in amazement.
“The bank’s broken,” said “Miss Rose” simply, in answer to her questioning glance, and pointed dully to the paper. “I might have known that little bank couldn’t hold out when so many big ones have gone under this year,” she went on, half speaking to herself.
Miss Arnold picked up the paper and read an article on the first page marked around with a blue pencil. She did not understand the technicalities, but she made out that the “City Bank” of a small town in Idaho had been forced to close, and that depositors would not get more than five or ten cents on the dollar.
“Every cent I’ve saved up was in that bank!” The woman turned herself slowly in her chair and laid her face down on the desk with her arms above her head. She spoke in muffled tones into which a strange bitterness had crept.
“I’ve worked all my life—ever since I was twenty—to get enough money to come to college on. I had barely enough to stay here at all—and now—” she stopped suddenly, breathing hard. “I haven’t been here a year yet,” she broke out at last.
“Well, I’ll have to go back to teaching. Great heavens! I thought I’d finished with that!”
Miss Arnold seated herself on a clear corner of the bed.
“Look here, ‘Miss Rose,’” she said, excitedly, “of course you aren’t going to stop college now, when you’re doing so well and—and we all like you so much and—and you’re just beginning your course.” She stumbled on—“Has everything gone?—can’t you do something?”
“Miss Rose” looked up slowly—“Everything,” she said grimly, and then, with the pathetically resigned air of one who has been used to misfortunes and has learned to accept them quietly, “I’ve worked all my life, I suppose I can go at it again.” She looked around her. “I’ll be gone this time to-morrow, and then I won’t feel so badly;”—she put her head down on the desk again.
Miss Arnold looked thoughtfully at her for a few minutes and then, with a sudden movement, she got up and went out, closing the door softly behind her.