Betty Wales decides

Madeline Ayres had come up to Harding to celebrate the acceptance of a novel by her favorite firm of publishers. Babbie Hildreth had come too, to help Madeline celebrate, and also to talk to Mr. Thayer about that most important topic, the date of “the” wedding. And so of course the “B. C. A.’s” had appointed a special tea-drinking, to celebrate the acceptance of the novel, the visits of Madeline and Babbie, the prospect of a wedding in their midst, and the general joys involved in the state of being “Back at the College Again,”—which is what B. C. A. stood for. Equally of course the tea-drinking was to be held at the Tally-ho.

But when the hour of the grand celebration arrived, a damper was put on everything; Betty Wales had sent a hastily scribbled note, by an accommodating freshman who was going right past the Tally-ho, to say that she was too busy to come.

“She’s losing her sporting spirit,” declared Madeline sadly. “In days gone by you could depend on Betty’s turning up for any old lark. She might be late, if she happened to be pretty busy, but she always got there in the end.”

“And I wanted to ask her about wedding dates,” wailed Babbie plaintively. “I can’t have my wedding when Betty can’t come. She’s almost as important as the groom.”

“Betty is awfully important to such a lot of people,” complained Mary Brooks Hinsdale, who was looking particularly fascinating in her new fall suit, the christening of which had added an extra spice of interest to the grand tea-drinking. “She is altogether too capable for her own good. If she were only as lazy, or as unreliable, or as devoid of ideas and energy, as most of those here present, she wouldn’t find it so hard to escape for tea-drinkings and other pleasant festivities. Which one of her dependents has her in its clutches this afternoon, I wonder?”

Babbie, to whom Betty’s note had been addressed, consulted it for further details. “She says she’s got to tutor a freshman,” Babbie explained after a minute. “I suppose she is helping along some one who can’t afford to pay for regular lessons. Seems to me there ought to be girls enough in college to do that sort of thing without putting it off on Betty. Betty is too valuable to be wasted on mere tutoring.”

“Poor girls ought not to need to be tutored,” announced Madeline, in her oracular manner. “Unless they are bright and shining lights in their studies, they ought not to try to go through college at all.”

“But Madeline——” chorused the permanent B. C. A.’s—the ones who were always on hand in Harding, because they were either faculty or faculty wives. “But Babbie—you two don’t understand. Haven’t you heard about Betty’s freshman?”

“No, we haven’t,” chorused the new arrivals. “Tell us this minute.”

Mary finally got the floor. “My children,” she began in her most patronizing style, “our precious Betty Wales is not engaged in assisting some needy under classman along the royal road to learning, as you seem to suppose. She is acting as special tutor to the only daughter of a Montana mining magnate. Named Montana Marie after the mine, pretty as a picture, clever at horseback riding but not at mathematics,—and the grand sensation of Harding College just at present,” ended Mary proudly. Then the permanents told the “properly excited” newcomers the whole story of Montana Marie O’Toole.

“She sounds extremely interesting,” said Madeline reflectively, when they had finished.

“Almost like a ready-made heroine,” suggested Mary, winking knowingly at the others.

Madeline nodded absently, and everybody laughed at what Mary called the egotism of the literary instinct.

“Why, haven’t you ever caught Madeline squinting at you to see if you’ll do for a book?” demanded Mary, elaborating her point. “She relates everything, even friends, to her Literary Career. I wore my new suit to-day in the frantic hope that she’d like my looks well enough to put me into a play. I should simply adore seeing myself in a play,” sighed Mary.

“Well, you never will,” Madeline assured her blandly. “Not while you call me ‘my child,’ and patronize me instead of my tea-shop.”

Mary listened, wearing her beamish smile. “Egotism of the literary instinct again—she makes a personal matter out of everything. Now, if you’ve quite finished explaining your methods of literary work, suppose we return to the business of the meeting, which is——”

“Which seems to be your frivolous methods of securing the attention of the wise and great by wearing new clothes,” cut in Madeline promptly. “A very interesting subject, too, isn’t it, my children?”

Mary faced the challenger coldly. “The real business of the meeting,” she announced, “is the rescue of Betty Wales from the clutches of her too-numerous jobs, charities, helpful ideas, and noble ambitions, including that interesting but heavily conditioned freshman, Montana Marie O’Toole.”

“But I thought Georgia had been regularly ‘elected’ to look out for Betty,” suggested Christy Mason.

“Well, Georgia is only one,” explained Helen Chase Adams seriously, “and being a prominent senior keeps her fairly busy, I imagine. And then Betty doesn’t want to be rescued. It’s very hard to look out for a person that doesn’t want you to look out for him—her,” amended Helen hastily, with a vivid blush that instantly created another digression among the B. C. A.’s.

“I thought you didn’t like men, Helen Chase.”

“Who is he? Who is your protégé who objects to being looked after, Helen?”

“When you said ‘him’ you were only trying to speak good English? Well, isn’t ‘her’ as good English as ‘him’?”

“You might as well own up to him right off and save yourself a lot of trouble. Detective Ayres will shadow you till you confess.”

But Helen displayed a hitherto unsuspected talent for clever sparring. “It’s just like you girls to make a lot out of a little,” she declared, so earnestly that everybody saw she meant it. “That’s why we have such good times,—because you make all the stupid little things in life seem interesting.”

“Well, don’t dare to deny that you’re a stupid little thing,” Mary told her, with an appreciative pat to emphasize that she was only joking. “And please be duly thankful that we can make even you seem interesting.”

“Oh, I am grateful,” Helen told her, with pretty seriousness. “But you ought to keep within the probabilities, and you ought to have more variety about your inventions. We’ve got romances enough on hand, without making up one for me.”

“The business of this meeting——” began Mary again at last, pounding hard on the table with one of the fascinating fat mustard jars which Madeline had summarily bought in London to start the Tally-ho Tea-Shop. “The business of this meeting——”

“Is just coming in at the door,” Rachel Morrison laughingly finished Mary’s sentence for her.

And sure enough, Betty Wales, looking very young, very pretty, also very care-free and happy for a person in dire need of rescue, was shutting the door with one hand, giving Emily Davis a handful of letters and memoranda with the other, and telling Nora about a special dinner order for that evening as she slipped off her ulster. Then she made a bee-line for Jack o’ Hearts’ stall and the Merry Hearts.

“Let me in—way in, please,” she begged, scrambling past Babbie, Helen, and Mary to the most secluded seat at the back of the stall. “I came after all, because I wanted some fun, and I won’t be dragged out to talk to anybody about dinners they want me to plan, or Student’s Aid things, or Morton Hall things—or even a conditioned freshman,” she concluded with a particularly vindictive emphasis on the last phrase.

“Hear! Hear!” cried Christy Mason.

“Oh, now I think maybe she’ll run away again to come to my wedding,” sighed Babbie, in deep relief.

“After all, she hasn’t lost her sporting spirit,” Madeline rejoiced. “She’s the same old Betty Wales, better late than never, and quite capable of looking out for herself, as well as for all the bothering jobs and charities and incompetent friends and touchy millionaires and insistent suitors and helpful ideas and noble ambitions that clutch at her with octopus fingers and threaten to drag her down.”

“Don’t talk like a book, Madeline,” Mary criticized. “And don’t be too cock-sure that you’re right. Just because Betty couldn’t stand it another minute and has rushed to cover, so to speak, in our midst, I for one refuse to be convinced that she doesn’t need help in fighting the octopus.”

Betty brushed a rebellious curl out of her eyes with a tired little gesture, and stared curiously at the disputants. “What in the world are you talking about?” she demanded. “Mary dear, please explain, because Madeline’s explanations usually just mix things up more than ever.”

Mary explained, noisily assisted by all the other B. C. A.’s, including Madeline, who “explained” at length how forgiving she was by nature, advised Mary to adopt the proud peacock as her sacred bird, and finally demanded of Betty if she—Madeline—hadn’t been perfectly correct in saying that she—Betty—was perfectly capable of getting along all right, if only she was not hampered by one more bother,—the unasked advice and assistance of the B. C. A.’s.

“Of course you’re right, Madeline,” Betty assured her, stirring her tea absently and forgetting to eat any of her muffin. “I detest people who can’t get along alone. It’s silly to try to do a lot more than you can, and then expect somebody to come along and take it off your hands. I hope I’m not that kind.” Betty dropped her spoon with a clatter, and, sitting up very straight, faced the table with a tragic look in her eyes and a desperate, determined set to her soft red lips.

“Girls,” she began, with a sudden change of tone that matched her changed expression, “can you remember solid geometry? I can’t. I never did know anything about Latin prose, so there’s no reason why I should now. But not knowing the geometry worries me. I think it’s getting on my nerves. And then,” she went on, as the little circle only stared at her in curious silence, “Marie’s lit. notes are just a mess. Mine were too, and anyhow I’ve lost my note-book. Is yours here, Helen? Could I take it, and Christy’s? I’m sure I could manage if I had a decent note-book or two.”

“Speaking of clear and lucid explanations——” began Madeline slowly. Then she reached across the table to hug Betty comfortingly. “You shall have all the decent note-books in 19—, if you want them, you poor thing. And I’m truly sorry that mine isn’t one of them. As for solid geometry, I’ll wager that not a person in this crowd could demonstrate—is that the right word for it?—a single proposition. And as for Latin prose, it’s a gift from the gods. You can’t learn it. Even Professor Owen, who is a genius, can’t teach it. So stop worrying here and now, and eat that muffin before somebody is tempted beyond what she can bear, and a theft is committed in our midst.”

“Is all this trouble caused by Montana Marie O’Toole?” inquired Christy practically.

Betty nodded, being too busy with the muffin to speak.

“Then,” Mary announced with decision, “what she needs is three regular graduate tutors, who specialize in lit., math., and Latin prose, and who will come to her rescue at any hour or hours of the day or night, at about one-fifty per.”

Betty swallowed a mouthful hastily, to say, “They wouldn’t help her any, Mary. They’d give up in despair after about one lesson. She’s not stupid exactly, but she’s poorly prepared, and her mind is—well, queer. Besides, I promised President Wallace. I agreed to ‘undertake’ her, as Mrs. O’Toole calls it, before he agreed to let her enter with so many conditions. She’s going to be positively broken-hearted if she fails at mid-years, and I think”—Betty hesitated—“I don’t think President Wallace will ever have any use for me again if she does. And I am busy with other things, and I never did know Latin prose, and—I’m about in despair.” Betty paused abruptly and attacked the remains of the muffin as if the eating of it would work a magic cure of all her woes.

“Betty,” asked Rachel after a minute, “does this freshman try? Does she want to get through enough to work for it?”

“She doesn’t know how to really work, Rachel, but she tries as hard as she can. She is awfully sweet and awfully sorry about making extra trouble. And of course you all understand,” Betty blushed a little, “that I’m being paid—altogether too much, I thought when they offered it—for looking after her.” Betty laughed suddenly. “Did you hear about her Mountain Day exploit? I had to speak to her about that, of course, to tell her that she mustn’t wear a magenta handkerchief, and shout so loud on the public highway, and otherwise make herself too conspicuous. And instead of being huffy, she thanked me and sent me violets. Oh, she’s a dear! She’s worth a lot of trouble, only I’m not bright enough to tutor her, and the regular ones would be sure to get provoked or discouraged at her queer ways, and just consider her hopeless, and let her drift along, and finally be flunked out at mid-years.”

“She ought to be flunked out, oughtn’t she?” inquired Helen Adams acutely. “I mean, she probably can’t ever keep her work up to the required standard without a lot of help.”

Betty admitted sadly that she never could. “But she needs the life here, Helen, almost more than any girl who ever came to Harding. And if I can help her to have a year or two of it, I shall,—as long as she keeps on trying to do her part.”

“Oh, yes, of course,” agreed Helen uncertainly.

“Is she in your freshman division, Helen?” demanded Mary Brooks, after a whispered conference with Babbie. “I judged not. Very well then. You are hereby elected to coach her in lit. No rule against a faculty’s doing a little friendly tutoring, is there? My husband hasn’t condescended to bother with any since he got to be head of his department, but before that——” Mary finished the explanation with a wave of her hand. “In the theme-work that goes with lit., Madeline is hereby elected to come to the front. Madeline, I presume you forgot, when you were talking about solid geometry, that our clever little Christy here has given up her faculty job to take a Ph. D. in math. She is hereby elected to assist Miss O’Toole to the comprehension of sines and co-sines, and so forth—or do sines and co-sines belong to trig.? And for Latin prose,” Mary’s beamish smile broke out radiantly, “of course you don’t know it, because it happened before your day, but Latin prose happens to be the one useful thing I ever learned. I say useful, because after all these years, I can use my one small scholarly accomplishment. Oh, I’ve kept it up! George Garrison Hinsdale has seen to that. Whenever he seems to be getting a bit tired of my frivolous appearance and conversation, I read him a little out of Horace or Juvenal or Cicero’s letters, and he’s so proud of me that I wish I had more scholarly accomplishments. Only,”—Mary smiled serenely,—“he says he likes me just as I am. And so, being the Perfect Wife, I will now turn into the Perfect Tutor, and get Marie Montana O’Toole through her Latin prose.”

“The business of this meeting having been disposed of,” Madeline took up the tale, “I hereby demand that we begin to celebrate in honor of me and my forthcoming novel.”

“And to discuss wedding dates,” added Babbie, “in honor of me and my Young-Man-Over-the-Fence.”

“Don’t you think,” suggested Rachel, “that first we’d better let Betty, who has just said she prefers to manage her own affairs, say what she wants to do about Mary’s elections?”

“When you are elected——” began Mary, but Helen, Rachel, and Christy, the serious members, silenced her.

“Now, Betty,” ordered Rachel. Betty looked solemnly from Helen to Christy, from Christy to Madeline, and finally at Mary.

“Would you really do it, girls?” she asked at last.

“Of course,” said Helen quietly.

“You can count on me, if you want me,” Christy told her.

“I can’t promise till I’ve looked over the freshman,” Madeline qualified. “If she is anywhere near as interesting as she sounds, I’ll ‘undertake’ her theme-work with much pleasure.”

“I’m simply dying to display my one accomplishment,” Mary declared feelingly.

Betty gave a long, happy sigh. “Then of course I want you all to help,” she said. “I was just about in despair when I came rushing down here. And now—you’re not regular tutors. You understand things. You know how I feel—and how Prexy feels. I couldn’t explain to a regular tutor that for some unknown reason Prexy cares a lot about Marie’s passing her exams. And I couldn’t tell them why she herself needs so much to stay on here. But you’ll see it all. Oh, dear! I’m so happy!” Betty crunched one of Cousin Kate’s cookies, and smiled radiantly at Mary, who had “elected” everything so beautifully.

“Well,” inquired Babbie, after a polite interval, “now can we begin to celebrate and plan weddings?”

“Easily,” Mary Brooks assured her. “Only don’t forget, all of you, whether you have been elected tutors yet or whether you haven’t, that you’ve each and all got to help. The B. C. A.’s have adopted a new object—we have undertaken Montana Marie O’Toole—and it may need our entire combined effort to make her a credit to us and to Harding. But we’ve got to do it. And do it we will!”

“Hear! Hear!” from Madeline.

“The B. C. A.’s to the Rescue!” cried Helen.

“Betty Wales and her freshman!” added Christy.

They drank the toasts with much enthusiasm in fresh cups of tea—poured out without the use of a strainer, because the next “feature” on the program was to be tea-ground fortunes all around, read by that past-mistress of the fine art of making everything interesting, Miss Madeline Ayres.