She darted across to her companion and seized her arm without noticing the quiver of distaste before it lay limp in her eager grasp.
“Oh, oh, it is, it certainly is! You are peeling. You will get through first and be set free and go back to the girls. I shall be left here alone. It isn’t fair. We both came the same day. Think of almost six weeks lost from college! My first spring in this beautiful place! It doesn’t mean so much to you, because you’re a junior. You don’t care.”
Lila had withdrawn her hand under the pretext of picking up a case knife to sharpen her pencil. Now though her lids were lowered as she hacked at the stubby point, she was perfectly aware of the hopeful curiosity in the freshman’s side glance at her. Lila despised the habit of side glances. For the past few days she had felt increasing scorn of a childishness that sought to vary by quarrels the monotony of their imprisonment. Hadn’t the girl learned yet that she—Lila Allan, president of the junior literary society—was not to be provoked into any undignified dispute by puerile taunts?
“You don’t care,” repeated Ellen from her old position at the window. “I guess you’d rather anyhow have all your time to write poetry instead of studying.” She glanced around just in time to see Lila’s lips set in a grimmer line as the lead in the short pencil snapped beneath a more impatient jab of the dull knife. She laughed teasingly.
“What’s the use of writing all that stuff now? You’re wearing out your pencil fast. Aren’t you afraid the paper will carry infection? Or will it be fumigated? I think it is silly to bother about germs. Oh, dear!” She began to drum again on the pane. “I’m so tired of this infirmary. There’s nothing to do. I can’t make up poetry. My eyes ache if I try to read.” Here she paused, and Lila was aware of another side glance in her direction.
“My eyes ache if I try to read,” repeated Ellen slowly, “and there is an awfully interesting story over on the table.” She stopped her drumming for a moment to listen to the steady scribble behind her. The little face with its round features so unlike Lila’s delicate outlines took on a disconsolate expression. “Do your eyes ache when you try to read,” for an instant she hesitated while a mischievous spark of daring danced into her eyes. Then she added explosively, “Lila?”
She had done it. She had done it at last. Never before through all the weeks of imprisonment together had she ventured to call Miss Allan by her first name. A delightful tingle of apprehension crept up to the back of her neck. She waited. Now surely something would happen.
But nothing happened except the continued scribble of pencil on paper in the silence. Oh, dear! this was worse than she had expected. It was worse than a scolding or a freezing or an awful squelching. It was the queerest thing that they were not even acquainted really after the many weeks. There was a shell around this junior all the time. It made Ellen feel meaner and smaller and more insignificant every minute. The freshman pressed her forehead wearily against the glass.
“Oh, look! There come the girls. They’re your friends away down on the lawn. Miss Abbott, I think, and Miss Leigh, and Miss Sanders. See, see! The rollicking wind and the racing clouds! Their skirts blow. They hold on their tams. They are looking up at us. They are waving something. Maybe it is violets, don’t you think? Once I found violets in March. Can’t you smell the air almost? I’m going to open the window. I am, I am! Who’s afraid of getting chilled?”
“I would advise you not to do anything so utterly foolhardy,” spoke Lila’s frigid voice. A certain inflection in the tone made Ellen shrink away instinctively. For an instant she looked full into the serene, indifferent eyes, and her own seemed to flutter as if struggling against the contempt she saw there. Then with a defiant lift of her head she hurried to the writing table and seized the pencil which Lila had dropped upon rising to approach the window.