Brenda's cousin at Radcliffe

by Helen Leah Reed

A week before the last rehearsal Julia had asked Angelina to spend all her time in Cambridge. There were so many little things that she could do in helping the girls about their costuming that it seemed as well to have her near for a week or two. Angelina could be spared, and Julia knew that the week or two in Cambridge would be almost as thoroughly a treat to her as a trip to New York to many another girl. Angelina had become more reconciled to her life at Shiloh, although she still continued to say frankly that she would prefer the city. Yet she had so enjoyed being of acknowledged use to her mother, and Julia had so praised her for her growing skill in housekeeping, that she was almost reconciled to her quiet life. All “The Four” had continued their interest in the Rosas. Brenda and Nora had provided their Christmas tree, with assistance, of course, from Julia. Julia had planned a little collection of books arranged in two or three small travelling libraries for the use of the Rosas and their neighbors, and when a check of good size came from Edith, to be applied to the use of the family, there was hardly any evident need to supply.

Edith and her parents were in Europe. They had felt keenly the fact that Philip had left college under a cloud, and it was even rumored that they might stay away another year. Julia, naturally enough, thought often of Philip, for that last interview with him had been rather thrilling, and while many of her friends were planning for the coming Class Day, she had made up her mind to leave Cambridge as soon as she could after the examinations. “If I live through the operetta,” she said to herself, for she felt the strain of the last rehearsals. When she thought of Philip, putting even the most charitable construction on his silence, it seemed as if he might have written to her.

Indeed it was only by a chance word dropped by Nora and other girls that she heard anything about him. They had their information from their brothers or some of their friends. Julia herself might have heard more directly had she been willing to bring up Philip’s name to Tom Hearst or some of his friends. But she would not ask questions, feeling as she did that Philip might have kept her informed of his whereabouts. Yet she knew that he had spent the most of the winter on a ranch in South Dakota, not so very far from the Black Hills; and when reports of the extreme cold in that region came to Eastern readers, who wondered how Philip enjoyed this rather hard life—Philip who had been used to all the luxuries provided for a rich man’s son at Harvard. But Philip did not write, and Julia would not ask even Ruth about him, although Ruth and Will Hardon were great friends.

XIX
THE OPERETTA

It was the last rehearsal but one, not the dress rehearsal, but the “half-dressed rehearsal,” as Clarissa called it. At the dress rehearsal a large number of undergraduates, and special friends of the performers were to be admitted, and then was to come the performance from which so much was hoped. But the dress rehearsal would be so much like a real performance that the present occasion was regarded as something very important.

Nearly all the chorus were wearing the short peasant skirt, and strutted about seeming on the whole well pleased with their own appearance. But the prima donnas were in ordinary attire, for their bespangled robes were too elaborate to be dragged about on the dusty stage. Polly and Ruth in bicycle skirts were rushing among the players, now giving directions to this one, then to that.

“You must stand better, and do come nearer to the front; and when Miss Harmon is singing, look toward her. You are supposed to be hanging on every word of hers (which we’re not usually in reality).”

The last words, of course, were sotto voce, and the chorus for the time being made a great effort to obey the energetic Ruth. Occasionally some girl, forgetting how much depended on her, would draw her neighbor aside for a tête-à-tête, to the great annoyance of the energetic managers.

Julia, in her chair in the centre of the floor below the stage, held the score, and from time to time contributed her word of criticism. But she was glad enough to have Clarissa and Annabel and Polly and Ruth bear the most responsibility, as it troubled her to have to pay too much attention to details. Clarissa and Annabel were lovers in the play, and to Polly this seemed rather ridiculous, feeling as she did that she had special insight into the dislike of Annabel for Clarissa. Clarissa, however, seemed unaware that Annabel was less than friendly; and although the latter was not always as perfectly amiable as the Princess in a light opera ought to be, the rehearsals had, on the whole, passed off pretty well. Polly herself, as it happened, was almost the centre of interest in the play. This had come about by accident rather than by actual intention on the part of Julia. She was a disguised Queen, disguised as a youth of humble birth, who had escaped from court for a frolic, whose grace and wit carried everything before her. Although she was apparently Clarissa’s rival for a while, everything was explained when at the very end her disguise was revealed. The operetta abounded in pleasing duets, bright dialogues, and witty hits and gibes. But the jokes and hits were never bitter nor purely personal. They were directed against the peculiarities of certain groups of students rather than against the students themselves. Cambridge, too, came in for its share of ridicule, although the jokes on this subject were rather threadbare, as they had all been used in other years by Harvard or Radcliffe undergraduates, in their dramatic performances or college publications.

On the whole, it was a composite production rather than the work of any one individual. Even in the matter of the music, Julia had accepted more than one suggestion made by her friends, and in one or two instances she had composed the words of the lyric, while Polly had composed the music. In the work of composing and arranging the operetta there had been really no friction, and all had been eager to make the affair a success. On this day, when the final performances were so near, there was hardly a girl who did not rejoice that they had come to the end of their weeks of work. Ruth was particularly gratified as they turned away from the hall. She gave a hop, skip, and a jump, undignified, perhaps, for a Sophomore, though expressive of her feeling.