Tracy Park: A Novel

by Mary Jane Holmes

'Oh, we can't be bothered with more than one basket in the train. I can find something there.'

He did not say what he intended to find, or that baskets were quite too common for him. But after leaving the young ladies in the evening, he went to a florist's and ordered for Jerrie a book of white daisies, with a rack of purple pansies for it to rest upon.

'That will certainly be unique, and show her that I have taste,' he thought.

For Nina a bouquet was sufficient, while for Ann Eliza Peterkin he ordered nothing. Tom could be lavish of his money where his own interest was concerned, but where he had no interest he was stingy and even mean, and so poor little red-haired Ann Eliza, who would have prized a leaf from him more than all the florist's garden from another, was to get nothing from him.

'What business has old Peterkin's daughter to graduate with ladies, any way?' he thought, and he looked on with a sneer, while Billy ordered five baskets, one of which was to be of white roses, with a heart of blue forget-me-nots in the centre.

'What, under heaven, are you going to do with five baskets?' he asked; but Billy was non committal, for he would not own that three were intended for Jerrie, whom he wished to carry off the palm so far as flowers were concerned.

And she did; for of all the young ladies who the next day passed in review before the multitude, no one attracted so much attention or received so much praise as Jerrie. For clearness of reasoning, depth of thought, and purity of language, her essay, though a little too metaphysical, perhaps, was accounted the best, and listened to with rapt attention. And when the musical voice ceased, and the young girl, who had never looked more beautiful than she did then, with the sparkle in her eyes and the flush on her cheeks, bowed to the audience, bouquets of flowers fell around her like hailstones, while basket after basket was handed up to her, Tom Tracy's book showing conspicuously from the rest and attracting unusual admiration.

But, alas for poor Harold's gift! Dick had watered it the last thing before going to bed and the first thing in the morning, but the flowers were limp and faded, and gave forth a sickly odor, while the leaves of the roses were dropping off, and only the size, which was immense, remained to tell what it once had been. But Jerrie singled it out from all the rest, and held it in her hands until the exercises were over; and that night, at a reception given to the graduates, she wore in her bosom two faded pink roses, the only ones she could make hold together, and which Nina told her smelled a little old. But Jerrie did not care. They were Harold's roses, which he had sent to her, and she prized them more than all the rest she had received. At little Billy's heart she had laughed till she cried, and then had given it to a young girl, not a graduate, who admired it exceedingly. Tom's book she knew was exquisite, and placed it with others, and thanked him for it, and told him it was lovely, and then gave it to Ann Eliza, whose offerings had been so few. A bouquet from Dick St. Claire and Fred Raymond, a basket from her brother, and one more from herself, were all, and the little red-haired girl, who, with her heavy gold chain and locket, and diamond ear-rings, and three bracelets, and five finger-rings, had looked like a jeweller's shop, felt aggrieved and neglected, and Jerrie found her sobbing in her room as if her heart was broken.

'Only four snipping things,' she said, 'and you had twenty-five, and mother will be so disappointed, and father too, when he knows just how few I got. I wish I was popular like you.'

'Never mind,' Jerrie said, cheerfully. 'It was only a happen so—my getting so many. You are just as nice as I am, and I'll give you part of mine to take home to your mother. I can never carry them all. I should have to charter a car,' and in a few moments six of Jerrie's baskets were transferred to Ann Eliza's room, including Tom Tracy's book.