Gabrielle E. Jackson

“ Helen looked the snowdrop to perfection, for if the pansies needed Ruth’s gypsy coloring for a foil, the snowdrops needed Helen’s pale blonde daintiness for theirs. The only color which relieved its pure white was the deep green of the wax-like leaves, and the contrast was perfect. The 283 dress was of that soft silvery white only to be contrived by the combination of satin and chiffon, and Helen looked very lovely.
Behind them, a dream of fairness, walked Toinette. Through the chiffon of her gown ran fine golden threads, which caused it to glint and glisten as the sunbeams. ”

“ A prettier, happier lot of girls could hardly have been found, and none looked lovelier, or happier, than Toinette. Her dress, a soft, creamy white chiffon, admirably suited to her golden coloring, had been sent to her by her father, whose taste was unerring. No matter how many miles of this big globe divided them, he never forgot her needs, and, if unable to supply them himself, took good care that some one else should do so. So the dress had arrived the night before, and Miss Preston had been able to give her another pleasant surprise for the dance. ”

“ Rockwood and Helen close at her heels. She reached the closet, flung open the door, and beheld a spectacle. Seated on the floor, in the midst of a scattered array of pots, kettles and frying-pans, her box of plates upset, her precious camera in her lap, and blissfully unconscious that the slide was open, sat Jean, a very picture of despair.
“Mighty man! And have ye been in here all this toim, an’ not to be smothered dead!” cried Mary. ”

“ It is not alone to learn that which is contained between the covers of a book that our girls are sent to school or college, but also to gather in the thousand and one things untaught by either books or words. These must be absorbed as the flowers absorb the sunshine and dew, growing lovelier, sweeter and more attractive each day and never suspecting it.
And so the shaping of Toinette’s character, so beautifully begun by the wise, gentle mother, 23 passed into other and less sensitive hands. ”

“ Knowing how cordially human nature detests doing the very thing best for it, she never had regular spelling lessons in the school, but twice a week every girl in it, big and little alike, gathered in the large assembly room to choose sides and spell each other down. So irresistibly funny were these spelling matches, and so admirably did they display Miss Preston’s peculiar power over the girls, and their response to her wonderful magnetism, that I think they deserve a chapter to themselves. ”

“ They had planned a delightful summer vacation, to be spent in travelling leisurely from place to place, as the fancy took them, and Toinette had suggested nearly all.
The five days at Montcliff were spent in driving about the beautiful country, playing tennis, rambling about the pretty woods, and doing an endless number of delightful nothings, as people can sometimes do when they fully make up their minds to put aside the cares of the world for a time. ”

“ Consequently, the girls were out of sorts and miserable, and the world looked decidedly blue, with only a faint rosy 30 tint far down in the horizon, where vacation peeped.
As in most schools, Saturday was a holiday. The day was wonderfully soft and mild for December, and shortly after breakfast Toinette threw her golf-cape about her shoulders and stepped out upon the piazza to see if the fresh air would blow away the mental vapors hovering about her, for she felt not unlike a ship at sea without a compass. ”

“ That was the letter you saw me post. Now, that is the truth, and I know that you believe me.”
Toinette had spoken very rapidly, scarcely pausing for breath, and when she finished gave a relieved little sigh and looked Miss Preston squarely in the eyes. Truly, her self-respect was regained.
Will some of my readers say: “What a tempest in a teapot?” To many this may seem a very trivial affair, but how small a thing can influence our lives! A breath, the passing of a summer shower, may help or hinder plans which alter our entire lives. And Miss Preston was wise enough to understand it. ”

“ It is beautiful, and can be carried out admirably. You must be my fair and lovely lily; then shall come my violet and daffodil; then my narcissus and lilac; then my pansy and modest little snowdrop. That will exactly suit Helen.”
“Who are to be the bridesmaids?”
“Edith, May, Ruth, Marie, Natala and Helen.”
“How nice of you to choose all the younger girls; it makes us feel so important. Now, let’s plan just what the dresses are to be,” said Toinette, becoming quite excited, and looking at Miss Howard as though all must be completed ere they left the summer-house. ”

“ The girl reached up, and drawing the hand close to her cheek held it there, but did not speak.
“So now,” continued Miss Howard, “I am going to ask you to help my outgoing from this happy home to be a pleasant one, by being my maid of honor when the time comes; will you, dear?”
“You want me to be the maid of honor, Miss Howard? You don’t truly mean it? There are so many other girls whom you have known so much longer, and whom you must love better than you do me; although I don’t believe they can love you any better than I do,” said Toinette, naively. ”

“ Toinette colored slightly at her thoughtless 163 remark, for she had not paused to think before speaking. All the girls knew that Helen’s purse was a very slender one, and that it was only by self-sacrifice and close economy that her parents were able to keep her at such an expensive school. She made no secret of her lack of money, but worked away bravely and cheerfully, always sunny, always happy, with the enviable faculty of invariably saying the right thing at the right time. She had pronounced artistic tendencies, and Miss Preston was anxious to encourage them in every possible way. ”

“ He had traveled about the world too much during the past six years not to have learned something of human nature, and to read it pretty correctly. Furthermore, his feeling of self-reproach made him keenly alive to every change upon Toinette’s speaking countenance, and when he saw the look of questioning surprise which came over it when one or the other of the Misses Carter made some playful overture at petting her, or one of the other girls, he drew his own deductions. ”

“ Ruth sat upon one side, and Edith upon the other, and it did not take the new girls long to discover that the dinner hour must be one of the pleasantest of the day, for all talked and chatted in the liveliest manner, discussing various happenings, and again and again appealing to Miss Preston, who was not one whit behind in the spirit of good-fellowship which prevailed. ”

“ There seemed no end to it, and it led them through the corridor, out of that into the kitchen, then out to a small store-room built beneath the kitchen porch. Here the end was tied to a very suggestive-looking tub.
Had Diogenes succeeded in discovering an honest man he could not have felt greater satisfaction than these girls felt at the sight of that modest little oval tub, with its sawdust covering; and the way in which it was pounced upon, 255 and borne in triumph to the laundry, brings my story of that night’s revels to a climax, and no more need be told. ”

“ Then came the bride, her hand resting lightly upon the arm of the friend who had led her along the greater part of her life’s pathway, for Miss Preston had been Miss Howard’s “guide, philosopher and friend” almost as long as she could remember. Very stately did she look, as she walked up that aisle to give away at the altar 284 something which the years had rendered very precious to her, for sometimes “old maids’ children” are more dear to them than are the children who claim the love of parents. ”

“ You are a far wiser woman than I am.”
“Perhaps no wiser, but better able to recall the things which helped to make my girlhood a sunny one, and school frolics played no small part in them.” 102
“I can but hope that the girls will refrain from practicing deceit. Of course, they cannot deceive me; no girl has ever yet succeeded in doing so, although many have tried to. But I can invariably detect the sham, and meet it successfully.”
“I hope you may never find yourself undone,” said Miss Preston, with a laugh. “Girls are pretty quick-witted creatures.” ”

“ There is only one who makes the boast that she has never been deceived by any girl, and we’ve all been just wild to play her some trick, only we’ve never yet hit upon a really good one.”
“You ought to get Toinette to do the scene from ‘Somnambula,’” said Cicely, laughing. 105
“What is it? What is it? What is it?” cried a half-dozen voices.
“The funniest thing you ever saw in all your born days,” said Cicely.
“Oh, tell us about it; please, do,” begged the girls.
“Let her do it for you; it will be ten times funnier than telling it.” ”

“ We can never dispose of such a cartload of stuff in a week if we don’t have the entire school to help us,” cried Toinette, as she lifted one thing after another from the box.
There is a saying that “Ill news flies fast,” but, in my humble opinion, it is as a stage-coach beside the Empire State Express when compared to the fleetness of good news. ”

“ Toinette had become very earnest as she talked, and was now leaning toward her father, her hands clasped in her lap, and her expressive face alive with enthusiasm.
Mr. Reeve hated to spoil the pretty picture, but said, in the interested tone so comforting when used by older people in speaking to young folk: “I am sure we can evolve some plan. I shall be very glad to speak to Miss Preston before I return to the city, and haven’t the slightest doubt that great things will come of it.” ”

“ So much depends upon an auspicious moment. A big door can swing upon a very small hinge.
As Toinette looked down the road with unseeing eyes, the whistle of an incoming train, brought her back to a realization of things around her. ”

“ They cannot understand your feelings, and, without meaning to be unkind or curious, would ask questions which it would embarrass you to answer. You are nervous and unstrung, so lie down on my couch and I will see that your dinner is brought up. I shall say to the other girls that you are not feeling well, and that it would be better not to disturb you.” Then, going into her bedroom, Miss Preston quickly made her own toilet. She had just finished it when the chimes called all to dinner, and, stooping over Toinette, she kissed her softly and slipped from the room. ”

“ It was as “rare” and “perfect” as dear Mother Nature could make it for one of her loveliest children.
The girls had dressed the church, until it seemed a very bower of bloom, and at every turn 280 Miss Howard would find the posies of which she was so fond. The three colors, if white may be called a color, chosen for the bridesmaids’ dresses were used in the decorations, and altar, chancel, transept and aisles were brilliant with daffodils, narcissuses and lilacs, which filled the church with their perfume. ”

“ It is difficult to understand how a parent can leave a child wholly to the care of strangers for so long a period as Mr. Reeve left Toinette, but one thing after another led him further and further from home, first to Southern Europe, then across the Mediterranean into wilder, newer scenes, where nations were striving mightily. ”