"NEW HAVEN --Mer-iden -- Hart-ford-- Springfield ... Boston Express on track No. 7!"
So the train announcer called, and the great crowd at the Grand Central Depot, who had been impatiently watching the hands of the marble clock move round toward noon, started breathlessly forward in the mad rush for seats.
The day was hot and close -- too hot for a day in mid-September -- and the pungent smell of coal gas from the locomotives was wafted down from the high, domey roof of the train shed, with smoke and steam, into the faces of the baggage-laden passengers. Past a hot, puffy, oily engine, down a long, long, interminably long platform before the car marked off by the green flag was reached -- and there they were at last!
A little party of four people were among those in the hustle to find for themselves single seats, and the gentleman of the party, going ahead, had found one; throwing down a suitcase upon the empty seat, he waited for the women folks to come up.
"Here you are, Kid," he called out, and a young girl of seventeen, whom father, mother, and younger sister escorted, was plumped down next to the window. "Now, have you got everything? Ticket safe -- keys -- trunk checks?"
"And, Helen dear, be sure to throw a wrap around you always, when you go out at night. Because, you know --"
"And don't forget your Sis, whatever you do." There was excitement and a suspicion of moisture in the eyes of the young person who occupied the red plush seat.
"Yes, of course, mother. -- Keep still, Sis! And -- and -- don't forget to send me that desk, daddy, that dull oak one, with the carved --" And then she burst out into tears. "Oh, you do make me ---"
"Never mind, daughter dear," said daddy. "It won't be long before you'll be getting home for your Christmas vacation. And if I have business up Boston way, I'll drop in and see my girl at Mount Holyoke. Have you got your money safe?"
"A-a-all 'board!"
"There, there. Be a good girl, Helen -- and remember what mamma --" The rest was lost in the close embrace that followed.
"Good-by, Sis! Don't forget New York and Flatbush."
"I--I won't. And write me all about the Erasmus games."
"Good-by, Kid --" and, administering a good, hearty smack, daddy, biting his mustache to keep back any traitor emotions, extricated himself from Helen's baggage, piled most of it up on the rack, and swung from the train just in time to wave her off, as she squeezed her head down by the partly opened window. . . .
"Is this seat occupied?" asked a voice behind Helen.
"Oh, no," hurriedly removing her umbrella and tennis racquet. "You may sit here."
She herself sank back on the hot, red plush again, as the train entered the dark, dank tunnel reeking with gases and soot.
Deep she was in thought, this tow-headed, blue-eyed girl -- deep in thought of a happy past, and an unknown though reputedly happy future. She thought of the examination she was to take the foliowing day and of her algebra squeezed in among the odds and ends in the suitcase on the rack; of the personal furnishings she had made sure to put in, for fear her trunks might be two or three days coming -- going over the inventory for the 'steenth time. And then back again to the college, the work and the pleasure, but mostly the pleasure. Not that this white-clad piece of humanity with the pert nose, who was wholesome if not pretty, was superficial, and went into things merely for what they were worth in good times. And yet how could a girl like this help it? She was born with an instinct for things social, and she could no more help letting her energies run in this direction than could ducklings help plumping into water. That was one reason why they sent her to Mount Holyoke -- to get her, they argued, under the calming influences of the all-pervading spirit of seriousness and work; and before she went away she had promised she would and would not do lots of things, for once curbing her independent nature.
And there she was now--oh, yes, the train had issued from the tunnel quite a while back, whizzed past the housetops of hundredth and two-hundredth streets, Bronx, and was now wandering its way amidmeadows. Pretty soon she got tired of watching Mennen's heads and Ingersoll watches and such signboards go tearing past, and suddenly remembered she had a seatmate.
This was a girl scarcely older than herself, but with a more settled look about her, who was reading a current magazine. Helen looked her over through the corner of her eyes. She was a trim, clear-cut girl, light-haired like herself, wearing a blue serge suit and having a general air of sureness and assertiveness of self. That was all Helen could make out by stolen glances, for she was interested in other stray girls that day, and wondered if she and this girl might not have a common destination.
"Get your tickets ready, please," announced a brakeman, who, as advance guard for the whitehaired, venerable old conductor, had opened the front door and was coming up the aisle. On came the latter behind him, mechanically punching, punching, punching, tearing off and pocketing -- he could have done all this asleep and not made a single mistake. Helen was sent hunting and routing the things out of her bag to find her ticket, which at last came to hand, was punched and returned to the owner. The other girl had folded hers and stuck it in the plush edging of the seatback in front of her, and Helen followed suit rather awkwardly, thinking all the while: "Wouldn't it be funny if she was a Freshman, too!" Another stolen glance toward the ticket, and her eyes fell on HOLYOKE, MASS. Gracious! She now looked full upon her neighbor.
"I -- I -- see you are going to Holyoke, too," she ventured, recovering from her surprise.
"Oh," said her neighbor, "are you going there? You mean to the college?"
"Yes, yes," rapturously. "You don't mean to say that you are! Yes, I'm a Freshman, too. Isn't it bully we can go up together!"
"Ye-es, rather. But -- you're really not a Freshman till you've registered -- they say. They call them sub-Freshmen."
"Oh, well, then we're Subs! It's just as good. May I ask your name?"
"Edith Brewster. I live in Montclair, N. J."
"And I am Helen Thompson -- from Flatbush. Have you any exams to take?"
"None," replied Edith quietly, a twinkle dancing in the off corner of her eyes. "I -- er -- enter on a certificate."
"Lucky girl! I got one for all but algebra, and her majesty the registrar wouldn't let me in on that, although I was always A 1 in math, because it is two years since I've taken it."
Now, Edith didn't really intend to "fib." Any outsider, with a long enough perspective, could tell she was not a Freshman; she had all the hot-headed, overconfidence of a "gay young Sophomore." An insider could have told by the small, heavy, dull gold triangle she wore, pinned over the heart of a bluestriped shirtwaist. All but a little Freshman could tell, "green" and submerged in self that she was.
But Edith wasn't going to dissolve the illusion. The spirit of fun was in her, and she intended to stuff her friend full of as many unreasonable things as the latter's gullibility would allow. Besides, since she wasn't asked her college denomination, but told at the outset she was a Freshman, was she not resting within her rights to leave things as they were?
"College must be a lovely place from what they say," broke in Helen.
"Yes, indeed it is."
"Oh, have you ever been there before?"
"Lots and lots of times. I had a sister graduate there this spring, and I always used to go up and visit her."
"Now, isn't that splendid! Wish I had a sister to carve my way for me. But I suppose I must forge my own. I suppose you expect to be taken into her sorority."
Edith grew red all over, but bit her lip and said nothing.
"Oh, I don't mean to be prying," explained Helen hurriedly. "I know they're always promised. I expect to make one myself."
"I wouldn't say that to anybody, if I were you."
"Why not?" was the astonished query.
"They are touchy about it and it spoils your chances. Besides, they'll think you're fresh."
"Oh, let them. I don't care."
But in spite of her stout denial, Helen blushed to her heart and, swallowing the "squelch," fell silent; for her feelings had been petted and pampered to the utmost sensitiveness, and the least prick smarted. It was not until they reached New Haven that she again addressed her neighbor.
"Lots of people getting on here," she remarked, looking down on the bustling scene, "and lots of girls, too. Yale does not open till October. Rob Douglas is going there this fall. Rob is my own particular friend," with a blush, "and he promised to send me a Yale banner in exchange for a Holyoke one. Blue for blue, you know. Did you have parties given you when you left?"
"Why -- they didn't make a particular fuss over me."
Helen detected grains of sarcasm in this speech and looked out of the window, saying nothing. But Edith regretted the impression she had evidently left, and after a while opened conversation again.
"Yes, it's a grand old place, and they have the best of times there. But you'll have to work like a galley slave, too."
"Is that so? Oh, I'm not afraid of that. I always stood tiptop."
"Well, so they all say. Why, you actually need two hours' preparation for each study -- with an average of three studies a day."
"Two hours! Oh, you're jollying me! Why, I used to spend two hours for all my lessons."
"It's no snap!"
"What if I don't want to study?"
"Oh, then it's 'flunk, flunk, pack up your trunk.' "
"Well," laughed Helen, "I guess it's not so bad as that."
"Not so bad! Wait till you see. Why, I had to --"
"You! Had to what? What do you mean?"
"Why -- er -- what was I talking about? Look at that beautiful goldenrod out of the window."
Helen looked, but did not press her query, though she was getting a little bit suspicious.
"Isn't it hot!" she resumed, fanning herself with her tennis racquet. "And cindery? Why, look! I must have about a ton of coal dust on me!" brushing off the little heaps. "My poor, snow-white garments!"
" Phoebe Snow ought to know better than to wear white on a road like this," remarked Edith, smiling. "You see, I shan't show the contrast quite as much as you when we get out."
"Well, Miss Know-everything, one would think you had experience. But you see," apologetically, "I wanted to look nice and fresh."
"You do," said Edith, smiling, "especially the latter." Whereat Helen kicked her foot very ostentatiously and relapsed again into a pained silence.
"Do they haze?" she finally asked. "You seem to know all about it."
Edith's eyes twinkled. She grasped the opportunity to scare this "green" girl with a little fibbing.
"Oh, my, yes; of course! It wouldn't be college if they didn't do it. But it's generally the fresh people they 'haze,'" she added significantly.
"Yes," retorted Helen, " and I guess it's the fresh people that do the hazing, too."
Edith laughed.
"Oh, well, it doesn't matter so much who does the hazing. Have you heard of the button field where the buttons grow, back of Pearsons?"
"Button field?"
"No? Then you have something to look forward to. But wait till they make you go through the mock turtle."
"Mock turtle!"
"Yes -- one of the animals they have in the Zoo -- and then -- But I'm not going to tell you."
"Do you expect to be hazed?" asked Helen gravely.
" Oh, no; not at all."
"I suppose you expect to crawl through on your sister's name. As a matter of fact, I think it will be fun getting hazed. I don't think it would be college without it."
"Well, I hope you'll get all you want," remarked Edith, her eyes dancing. "As for me, 'Give me liberty or give me death!'"
And from this they branched into topics of more serious moment, striving to be as pleasant to each other as possible. For Edith thought Helen fresh and was getting to dislike her; Helen thought Edith a prig, and was doing likewise. The Freshman was not in the least comfortable in the other's proximity.
"I hope the rest of the Freshmen aren't like her," thought Helen. "She needn't flaunt her sister in my face! She won't get in my good graces for her sake!"
"Isn't she dreadfully fresh! " observed Edith mentally. "They get worse and worse every year!"
On and on bowled the train; in and out, and around curves and over trestles. It was almost startling to the girls when at last the brakeman flung open the door and called out:
"Spring-field! Spring-field! Do not leave any articles in the car!"
" Well, here we are," said Edith nervously, as she anticipated the reunions to come. "And there's our train on the other track. We --"
Helen was feverishly struggling with her baggage on the rack; the obliging brakeman came to the rescue.
"Oh, thank you," she said, blessing him in her heart. "I never thought it was so much. You see, all my family escorted me to the depot, and they each carried a piece."
In the scurry and bustle of finding a porter to carry her traps to the B. & M. train, Helen lost Edith. Perhaps Edith lost herself purposely, chafing at being tied down to a raw Freshman, so that she could not share in the rapturous reunions of the "upperclassmen" now going on in the other train. Such a rush was there as friend met friend again after the three months' separation.
"Oh, Betty dear, so glad to see you!"
"Why, Jo, how fat you've grown! You look like a Japanese idol! -- Fan!"
"Oh, you should have been with me in the Adirondacks! Why didn't you come when I wrote you?"
And so on and so forth. The very air tingled with excitement. Fond embracing and kissing was all the order; the college girls owned the B. & M. that day.
Swarming over with students and baggage, sweltering like a hot box and floating full of malignant cinders, the cars rolled along to the north. Helen was lost amid new faces.
"HOL-YOKE!"
There they were in that little French section among the paper mills at last; and such a "piling out" as there was!
"Are you a Freshman?" asked a sweet voice in her ear, as Helen stood among her belongings on the station platform.
"Yes," she said, facing about -- "at least, a sub-Freshman."
"Oh, then I want you. My name is Anna Clark, and I'm a Sophomore. Please introduce yourself."
Helen looked the speaker over. She could hardly believe her eyes; for it was impossible that this small, frail girl with the sweet, likeable smile could be a horrid Sophomore.
"My name is Helen Thompson," she said. "It's sweet of you to come."
There were other upperclassmen-Seniors and Juniors -- gathering in lonely Freshmen along the platform.
"This way, Freshmen! This way, Freshmen!" called an enterprising Junior. And pretty soon she had quite a collection of newly entering girls, taking their trunk checks and passing them over with directions to Mr. Sawyer, the expressman, who was to have the colossal task of carting some thousand or more trunks to the college at South Hadley in the course of the next two or three days.
Having arranged for Helen's baggage with the expressman, Miss Clark now began to gather up the former's belongings in her small hands.
"Why--why-- I couldn't think of letting you carry these, Miss Clark," protested Helen. "You really mustn't --"
"Come along; I'll take the tennis racquet, umbrella and suitcase -- you take the other suitcase and the bag."
"But --"
"You must always obey orders of your seniors, my dear. Come along to the trolley."
Off they went, Helen regretting for the second time that she had brought so much hand baggage and apologizing for it.
"You must think I have lugged all my belongings in there. Oh, I'm so very sorry -- especiaily that orders are orders."