It happened, therefore, that on the very day after the opening of college Pamela found herself moving her possessions to Miss Batson’s French-roof cottage. She was to do certain work in consideration of room and board, and she was to have a fair amount of time to herself. Miss Batson did not offer her, nor did she desire, any money payment for her services. Indeed, she considered herself almost rich. She had room and board provided for her for the year, and after paying her tuition fees of two hundred dollars she would have one hundred dollars left for books, clothes, and incidentals. This to her seemed a very large sum.
Yet there was one thing that troubled her. She would have liked a room to herself, and she found it hard instead to regard as a bedroom the sofa-bed in Miss Batson’s little plush-trimmed parlor. But in a few days she became fairly contented with this arrangement, and toward nine o’clock each evening would close the folding-doors so that she might go to bed without disturbing Miss Batson’s boarders, who often entertained visitors in the little front room.
For her study she had a corner of the dining-room table; and though her work was often interrupted by questions and comments from Miss Batson, who would look in upon her occasionally, she still reflected that she might have been much worse off. Yet sometimes she sincerely pitied herself. “It isn’t exactly pleasant to be living in a house without a single corner that I can call my own. I can never invite any one here to see me. For although Miss Batson is very kind, I know that she regards me as ‘help,’ a refined species of ‘help’ to be sure, but still only ‘help.’”
She had felt strongly drawn to Julia Bourne, and she hoped that she might be able to see much more of her. Yet she reddened as she thought of Julia in much the same way that she reddened whenever the subject of her boarding-place came up. Although she was a minister’s daughter, although she realized the sin as well as the folly of false pride, she yet felt uncomfortable whenever she reflected that to the unprejudiced observer, indeed to any one except Mrs. Dorkins, she might seem to be only Miss Batson’s “help.”
Miss Batson’s boarders could not understand her. They were young women who earned fairly good pay, as expert bookkeepers or clerks. They knew that Pamela was a student, and one or two of them were sorry that so delicate a looking girl should be obliged both to work and to study.
“It isn’t that the work is so hard,” said the youngest of the bookkeepers, “but to think of a little thing like her studying those great books. I’ve noticed her coming in in the evenings, and she’s always loaded down with books. Anybody’d have to wear glasses if they spent all their time looking into books. I wouldn’t do it myself. Why, it must be most as hard as school teaching, and I always thought that that was dreadful.” Yet Miss Batson’s young ladies (for in this way did their landlady always speak of them) in spite of these occasional criticisms were proud to have a college student living in the house. They were inclined to be very friendly, and Pamela sometimes reproached herself for keeping them at a distance. Their well-meant familiarities annoyed her, and she found it hard to conceal her feeling. In consequence she was much lonelier at Miss Batson’s than she need have been.
It was rather an understanding than an arrangement that she should be at home in the afternoon in time to help Miss Batson prepare her half-past six tea. This meant that Pamela should be at home by half-past five; and as she always walked home from the Square, she had to leave Fay House by five o’clock. There was really no hardship in this, since all recitations were over by half-past four. On the other hand, Pamela had decided that to do her duty by Miss Batson she ought to refrain from any part in the social life of the college, for she had learned that nearly all the clubs and receptions were held between half-past four o’clock and six.
It was on this account that she had given up the Freshman reception. In spite of her Spartan resolve, Pamela had just a little longing for the fun that certainly formed a legitimate part of college life. Although she had had more than her share of care, although of a more serious temperament than many of her classmates, she was still girl enough to see the possibility that Radcliffe offered for social enjoyment. Yet with this perception came a sense of her own lack of adaptability to people; instead of attracting them, she felt that she rather repelled those whom she met.
V
COLLEGE CALLERS
One afternoon as Julia and Ruth were walking toward Elmwood a human whirlwind stormed past them, composed, as it seemed, chiefly of woollen sweaters and legs in knee breeches.