Adele Doring at Boarding School

“Where are you, girls?” Adele called one crisp November day as she whirled down Apple-Blossom Alley and entered the corner room where many of her particular friends were assembled. They looked up eagerly at her entrance, and Betty, noting that her hands were behind her, exclaimed in little-girl fashion, “Oh, Della, what are you hiding? If it’s candy, I choose the right.”

“It’s better than candy,” Adele declared. “Do you all give up?”

“It’s a letter!” Peggy Pierce said mischievously.

“Oh, Peg, that isn’t fair! You peeked!” Adele protested, then bringing the missive around front, she added, “It was really sent to Gertrude, but she is busy with the baby class, so she asked me to read it to you. In a thousand years you couldn’t guess whom it is from or what is in it. Gertrude is delighted about it, and so am I.”

“Della, you are so provoking! Please don’t keep us ‘suspended’ this way, as Bob says,” Rosamond pleaded. “Nothing exciting has happened in ever so long, not since we tamed Katrina.”

“That was only last Saturday, and this is Wednesday,” Adele replied merrily. “I’ll give you a tiny hint. It’s an invitation from a neighbor.”

“Oho, I know then,” Doris Drexel sang out, “for the only neighbor with whom we are any of us acquainted are those nice Ellsworths about whom you and Gertrude were telling us.”

“Right you are, Dory dear! Now, lend me your ear and you shall hear!” Adele chanted as she sat on the rug tailor-wise and unfolded the pale-blue sheet of note-paper.

“My dear Miss Gertrude and Miss Adele:”

she read—

“Oh-h!” moaned Betty Burd, “I thought it was going to be an invitation for all of us.”

“So it is!” Adele said brightly. “I haven’t finished reading.” Then she continued:

“Oh, what glorious fun that will be!” Peggy Pierce exclaimed. “It will give us a chance to wear our pretty party dresses. Mine is blue and brand new and I am wild to appear in it.”

The other girls were equally glad, but they had no time to express their pleasure, for at that moment a gong was calling them to their classes.

Madame Deriby’s permission was readily obtained, and Betty Burd declared that she just knew that she wouldn’t sleep a wink, but the next morning Adele had to throw a pillow to awaken the little maiden.

“Betty!” she called. “You can’t guess what’s going to happen to-day!”

Their youngest rubbed her eyes, and then, leaping out of bed, she pirouetted about gleefully while the older girls begged her to watch out for pins.

Thanksgiving Day had dawned golden and bright, and the girls were so excited that the morning hours seemed to drag, but at last the noon repast was over and they flocked to Apple-Blossom Alley to deck themselves in their prettiest finery.

At one o’clock many of them, with completed toilets, were in the corner room admiring one another and bubbling over with joyous anticipation, when there came a knock at the door.

“Peg, please open it!” Adele was busily fastening Betty’s hardest hooks.

It was Marie, the maid, carrying a long, large box. “For Miss Gertrude,” she said with a smile.

“Oh, Trudie, who do you suppose has been sending you flowers?” exclaimed Rosamond, the romantic.

“I can’t guess, but we will soon know,” the other said brightly as she snipped the yellow cord.

“Oh! Oh! What pretty, curly chrysanthemums!” Doris Drexel cried. “Here’s a little envelope, Trudie,” she added, lifting it from the blossoms and handing it to the older girl.

“They are from Arthur Ellsworth for all of us!” Gertrude said. “How nice it was of him to send them. You know, one always wears a chrysanthemum on Thanksgiving Day.”

“There’s something on the back of the card, Trudie, and you didn’t read it.”

“Suppose you read it then, Bettykins.” Gertrude was separating the flowers and giving one to each maiden, so Betty read:

“At the hour of three
A surprise there will be!”

“How exciting!” Peggy Pierce exclaimed as she whirled about gleefully.

“Here comes Patrick up the drive. Get on your hats and cloaks, everybody,” Adele announced. “It’s time to go!”

Little Alise was eagerly watching out of the wide front window in the library, and, when she saw the school bus turn in at the drive, she exclaimed joyously:

“Oh, Auntie Louise, here comes big sister Gertrude. Let’s you and I open the door.”

Miss Ellsworth, whose new happiness was shining in her face, nodded a dismissal to the maid who had come to answer the call of the knocker, and she and Alise greeted the merry girls.

Then the laughing, chattering child, holding fast to Gertrude’s hand, led them up the curving stairway to a beautiful upper room, where they were to lay aside their wraps.

Then down they trooped, looking, so thought the lady who stood waiting in the hall below, like a flock of daintily colored butterflies.

There was a big log cheerily burning on the wide hearth, around which comfortable chairs had been drawn. Miss Ellsworth bade them be seated and for a time they talked together, little Alise, with her excited happy chatter, preventing the occasion from being a formal one.

Rosamond, remembering what had been written on the back of the card among the flowers, looked often at the clock, and, when it was five minutes to three, she glanced meaningly at the girls nearest her, and indeed they were all wondering what the surprise was to be. Just as the bells in a beautiful marble clock were chiming the hour, a door at one side of the fireplace opened, and Arthur Ellsworth entered. He was followed by three other young men who were rather peculiar-looking, as each had long, dark hair and a heavy, drooping mustache. Arthur introduced the newcomers, but their names were so difficult to pronounce that the girls decided that these friends of their host must all be Russians.

Miss Ellsworth took this occasion to slip away to attend to some matter pertaining to the dinner and Alise went with her.

Arthur then asked the girls if they would like to see the gallery which adjoined the library. Rosamond found herself walking by the side of one of the supposed Russians, who seemed to be strangely silent. Believing that he must be very shy, Rose said, “Mr. Mellowisky, your name is such a long one that I am not sure that I have it right.” Then, not knowing what else to say, she inquired, “Is this your first visit to Linden?”

“Yes, Mademoiselle, it is!” was the reply. The girl was puzzled. Surely she had heard that voice before. She turned and looked intently at her companion and saw a pair of blue eyes twinkling with mischievous laughter.

“Bob Angel!” she cried. “If you had not spoken, I never should have recognized you, but you couldn’t disguise a voice that I have heard ever since I was knee-high to a grasshopper.”

How Bob laughed as he pulled off the wig and mustache. Adele, whirling about, clapped her hands merrily. “Oh, Rosie!” she exclaimed, “I recognized Jack the very first minute.”

“And I did Bob,” Bertha confessed, “but I didn’t want to spoil the fun till Rosie found him out.”

“Am I the only one to go unrecognized just because I haven’t a sister?” the third young man asked dolefully.

“Oh, you are Donald Burnley!” Betty Burd exclaimed joyously. “Isn’t this the best surprise that there ever could be?”

The ringing of musically toned Chinese gongs was calling them to the dining-room, and it was not until they were seated that the mystery was explained.

“I don’t see how you happen to know our brothers, Mr. Ellsworth,” Adele said, turning at once to Arthur.

“I went to school with them in Dorchester,” that lad replied. “When you told me that you were from Sunnyside, I afterwards, in thinking of it, wondered if you were related to Jack Doring, and I wrote him to inquire. When I found that he and Bob both had sisters at Linden Hall, I decided, with Aunt Louise’s permission, to invite them to our Thanksgiving party. Donald, being my particular pal, I also included, although you are none of you especially interested in him.”

Peggy and Betty exchanged quick, twinkling glances, and Adele hurriedly led the conversation in a safer direction, not knowing what those mischievous maidens might say.

After dinner the young people sang and danced until twilight brought Patrick and the bus. The girls thanked Miss Ellsworth for the delightful afternoon and each received a loving hug from little Alise.

The boys accompanied the guests back to the school, as Adele and Bertha were eager to introduce their nice brothers to Madame Deriby.

The matron was pleased with all four of the manly boys and invited them to visit the school whenever they wished.

Then, as they were to return on the evening train to Buffalo, Arthur drove them to the station in his car and the girls waved until they had disappeared.

“Well, that certainly was a happy surprise!” Adele declared when half an hour later the girls in their gaily colored kimonos were gathered in her room and sat around the fire to talk over the party.

“Do you know,” Betty Burd suddenly exclaimed, “I think Arthur Ellsworth is the nicest boy, and I really believe that he particularly likes our beloved Gertrude.”

“Bettykins, what an imagination you have!” the young teacher said, and then there was a chorus of merry good-nights, for the lights-out gong was sounding in the corridor.