“You always monopolize Dr. Hinsdale,” retorted Madeline, who was waiting, so she said, to go down-stairs under Mary’s protecting wing. “At the last Dramatic Club reception he didn’t so much as speak to any one else.”
“Well, neither did I, for that matter,” said Mary thoughtfully, “so why don’t you say he monopolized me? It sounds very much better.” She gave a final glance into the mirror. “I shan’t let Dr. Eaton monopolize me,” she added as she went out, “but I shan’t let him monopolize any one else either.”
Mary was a great favorite with most of the faculty, for the simple reason that she stood not at all in awe of them, but chattered on to the learned Miss Ferris or the dignified Professor Lawrence just as spontaneously as if they had been Harvard freshmen or members of the clan. Mrs. Kent was a great admirer of Mary’s social gifts, and knowing that her supply of small talk never failed her, she seized upon her the minute she appeared and turned her over to the new German professor, who was stranded in a corner, looking sadly at the gay groups around him and wishing himself and his scant knowledge of English safe back in the Fatherland. Mary put him at his ease immediately, for her German was a trifle worse than his English; and in trying to set her right and supply the words she could not remember he forgot his own mistakes. He was soon cozily ensconced in a nook under the stairs, eating chocolate parfait and trying to understand why he must not ask a young lady’s permission “to hold her a few moments after the class.” Mary, for her part, was so absorbed in her efforts to explain the subtle difference between hold and keep that she had entirely forgotten Dr. Eaton, and she and her escort were probably the only persons in the room who did not stop talking to stare at him when he came in. Mrs. Kent looked anxiously around for Mary to take this distressingly haughty young man off her hands, but the stairs screened her and her German, and Mrs. Kent flew to Betty Wales, who was having a beautiful time talking to her beloved Miss Ferris.
“Come, child,” she said, “and amuse the melancholy Dane. You girls all seemed to be delighted because he was coming, but for my part I can’t see why. I’ll take care of Miss Ferris, but I can’t and won’t talk to him any longer.”
So Betty rose obediently and was duly presented to Dr. Eaton, who to her astonishment came immediately out of his melancholy and received the introduction with evident pleasure. He smiled his rare smile as he shook hands, and when Betty asked him if he wanted an ice he seized two from a passing waitress in a summary fashion that bespoke much experience with afternoon teas. It couldn’t be that he was a woman-hater, Betty decided.
“I wish I could find you a seat,” he said, glancing down the long hall. “Ah, I have it! Is that little room off there forbidden territory?” As the little room was Mrs. Kent’s parlor, which was always opened for house teas, Betty led the way there and sat down, wondering why in the world Dr. Eaton had “wanted to meet her for a long time,” and what in the world they should find to talk about.
Dr. Eaton settled the second question easily enough. “Well,” he began, drawing a chair nearer to the one that Betty had chosen, “has your mother gone?”
“Yes,” answered Betty in amazement, “she went to-day.” (Mrs. Wales and the smallest sister had started that morning for Chicago.) “But how, please, did you know anything about my mother?”
“I had a note from her,” answered Dr. Eaton calmly, “so I knew that she had been here; and as it was some little time ago, I naturally concluded that she might have left. It really wasn’t difficult.”
Betty stared at him in utter bewilderment and blushing confusion. Her mother had never been to Harding. And what could she have written about to Dr. Eaton? Ever since her father’s famous telegram to the registrar at the beginning of her freshman year, Betty had lived in dread of some similar breach of college etiquette on the part of her parents. Now it had come. Her mother had probably asked Dr. Eaton to give shorter lessons.