“Yes, I know just how she is,” chimed in Maud Bradley. “She just fidgets and fidgets. She’s for all the world as bad as her eight-year-old brother, and he is the most disagreeable little kid in the whole town. I sat beside her in church one Sunday when our seat was full, and I was glad when the service was over. She kept turning and twisting and fixing her hat and smoothing her gloves. She had gloves on, so she couldn’t bite her nails then. She hummed the tunes while the minister was reading the hymns, and she tore a paper into small bits while the prayer was going on. I didn’t have a minute’s peace. I’m sure I don’t know how anybody could be expected to enjoy her company. She’s enough to spoil things wherever she goes. By all means, don’t let us invite her. Don’t you say so, Cornelia? Wouldn’t it simply spoil everything if Effie Martin went along with us?”
Cornelia Gilson, a flashy little girl with copper-colored bobbed hair and a yellow frock, had come in while they were talking and listened with an indignant frown.
“What! That Martin girl? Eleanor’s kid sister? Well, I should say so,” she answered quickly. “What are you all thinking about? Why should she be invited? She never was before!”
Janet Chipley ventured to explain. “Why, Flora Garner says she told her she wanted to go just awfully, and now they have the new car, and Eleanor is to be allowed to take it, and she thinks the girls will ask her.”
“Well, we certainly will not!” declared Cornelia indignantly. “She’ll find she is mistaken. I should think her own sister would make her understand that. She is not old enough for our crowd. She’s only fourteen.”
“Well, I guess she’s fifteen,” admitted Maud reluctantly, “but she doesn’t act like it.”
“Girls, you’re all mistaken about her age. She’s sixteen. Her birthday was last week,” spoke up Flora Garner timidly. “She wants to go dreadfully. Her sister doesn’t want her to, one bit, and she didn’t want to ask her to secure an invitation, so she asked me. I felt awfully embarrassed, for I didn’t know what to say.”
“Sixteen! Well, I should think she would be ashamed. Why, she acts like a big, tough boy. Last summer at the shore, she came tearing down the boardwalk with her hair flying, chasing Tom Moore and bound to catch him before they reached the bathhouses. I felt awfully humiliated to have her come up to me a few minutes after, when I was talking to Mrs. Earle and her son, and say, ‘Hello, Jan!’ She was chewing gum, too. And think of it, I had to introduce her. Mrs. Earle is so sweet; she takes in everybody, and she put out her hand and said, ‘Is this your cousin, Janet?’ Then after I told who she was, Mrs. Earle drew her aside and told her softly, so that her son would not hear, and with a great many ‘my dears,’ that there was a big tear in her skirt. And what do you think that poor fish did? She just laughed out loud and pulled the tear around and stuck her finger in it and said, ‘Oh yes, I know it. That’s been there two weeks. Most everybody’s told me of it now. It’s too much trouble to mend it down here. It’s bad enough to have to sew when I’m at home.’ Just then Tom Moore came in sight again, and without saying good-bye or anything, she started and ran, calling, ‘Ho, Tom, you can’t catch me again! I dare you to!’ I was so mortified I could have sunk down into the sand with a good will and never come up again. Lawrence Earle looked after her with the most curious expression. If she had seen him she would never have held up her head again.”
“Oh yes, she would, Janet,” said Maud, laughing. “You don’t suppose a little thing like that would bother her. Why, she’s got brass enough to make a pair of candlesticks. The thing I don’t understand is how she happened to be so utterly ill-mannered, with so lovely a mother.”
“Well, surely, girls,” said Ethel Garner, “if her own sister doesn’t want her, we can’t ask her to go along. What is the use of discussing her any further? I, for one, am tired of the subject. She is full of disagreeableness and apparently has not a single virtue.”
“You’re forgetting, Ethel,” put in Janet Chipley sarcastically, “she can ride a bicycle!”
“Oh yes, she can ride a wheel”—laughed Ethel with a sneer and a curl of her lip—“but she does even that like a clown. She would rather stand on the saddle with one toe and go flying down Main Street than anything else in the world. She just wants to show off her acrobatic feats! I can’t understand why her mother lets her. She’s too old to ride a bicycle. None of the other girls do.”
“You were just saying she wasn’t old enough to go with us,” urged Flora mischievously.
“Well, you know perfectly what I mean, Flo. Don’t try to be clever! She acts just like a great big, overgrown small boy. And the way she plays baseball and tries to get in with the boys! She thinks she’s so smart because they praise the way she pitches. She thinks it’s so wonderful to be able to pitch like a boy! I think it’s unladylike. And she goes whistling through the streets, and she never looks even neat! Her clothes are simply a mess! And her hair is a fright! If she went along, she’d be sure to disgrace us all in some way. Decidedly, no! She’s a flat tire if there ever was one. Don’t you all say so, girls?”
“Yes I do,” said Maud Bradley. “Come, let’s drop her and get to work. There’s the route and the time and the lunch to plan for, and the afternoon is going fast.”
The little company of brightly dressed girls settled themselves in the hammocks and chairs that were plentiful in the summerhouse and went to work in earnest.
Meantime, on the other side of the carefully trimmed hedge, stretched full length on the soft, springy, sweet-smelling earth, her elbows on a mossy bank, her face in her hands, her cheeks very red, her eyes on an open book, lay Effie Martin, the subject of all this conversation. She had taken her book after dinner and slipped off to this group of trees between her father’s lawn and that of Mr. Garner’s. It was a favorite retreat for her, away from the noise of her teasing brother, and the possible calls of conscience when she heard the work of the house going on and knew that she ought to be helping. She did not like to work, and she did love to read. She often came here when she wanted to be alone. She had found this particular bit of mossy turf, covered by clean, spicy pine needles. She did not know that in the summer arbor, opposite, Ethel and Flora Garner would receive their friends that day.
She would not have hesitated on that account if she had known. It did not occur to her that she would be liable to hear conversations not meant for her ears. When she had first heard voices approaching the hedge on the other side, she had paid little heed to them, but had read on until she suddenly heard her own name and became aware that she was the subject of much unpleasant remark. Her cheeks flamed with anger, and her big black eyes sparkled dangerously. It did not occur to her that she was an eavesdropper or that she ought to get up and go away. She would probably not have gone if it had occurred to her. It had never been fully impressed upon her that there was anything wrong in listening to what is not intended for one’s ears, especially when the theme is one’s self.
The girls on the other side of the hedge went on discussing her personal habits. It had never occurred to her that she had personal habits before or that those habits could be agreeable or disagreeable to others. There was something startling in hearing them portrayed in such unpleasant tones. Her heart beat fast with indignation. So this was what they thought of her. Her first impulse was to start to her feet and rush into their midst, but what could she do? They were but stating their opinions.
She