Out from under the beds and from the closets in the two bedrooms crept one after another the girls of the club. All were there but Susan and Gladys; and they would have been invited, but it was well known that if Gladys broke a rule of the school, she never rested until she had made full confession to one of the teachers. She was not to be trusted in the least; and, of course, Susan could not be invited without her, so the knowledge of the spread which was to succeed the tableaux had been carefully kept from them. No wonder at Jenny’s reception of her!
Somewhat staggered by this, and by the appearance of the hidden, laughing girls, Gladys stood for a moment staring blankly around her, then she asked, singling Kate Underwood out from among the others,—
“Kate! did you write that poem to make fun of Marion Parke’s country cousin?” 81
“Why do you ask?” answered Kate, turning brusquely upon Gladys.
“Because, if you did, and if, as Sue says, you got up those tableaux to make fun of him, I think you are the meanest girl in the school; and as for the club—a club that would do such a thing, I wouldn’t be a member of a moment longer, not if you would give me a million dollars!”
“Well, as we have no million to give you, and wouldn’t part with even a copper to have you stay, you can have your name taken off the roll any time,” said the president majestically.
“All right, it’s done then; but my question is not answered. Kate Underwood, did, or did you not, intend to make fun of Marion Parke’s cousin?”
“When I know by what right you ask me, I will answer you; until then, Gladys Philbrick, will you be kind enough to speak in a lower voice, unless you wish to bring some of the teachers down upon us, or perhaps you will report us to Miss Ashton; I think she has just come in the late train, I heard a carriage stop at the door.”
“You want to know my right?” answered Gladys, without taking any notice of Kate’s taunts. “It’s the right of being ashamed to hold a girl up to ridicule for what she couldn’t help, and a girl like Marion Parke. I hoped you could say you didn’t mean to; but I see you can’t.” Then Gladys, without another word, left the room, leaving behind her a set of girls who, to say the least, were not in a 82 mood to congratulate themselves on the events of the evening.
The spread was hastily put on the table again, but it was eaten by them with sober faces and troubled hearts.