CHAPTER III
THE PROFESSOR

Molly beat and kicked on the door wildly. Then she called again and again but her voice came back to her in a ghostly echo through the dim aisles of the cloistered walk. She sat down on a bench and burst into tears.

How tired and hungry and homesick she was! How she wished she had never heard of college, cold, unfriendly place where people insulted old friends and they locked doors at six o’clock. The chill of the evening had fallen and the stars were beginning to show themselves in the square of blue over the Cloisters. Molly shivered and folded her arms. She had not worn her coat and her blue linen blouse was damp with dew.

“Can this be the only door into the Cloisters?” she thought after the first attack of homesick weeping had passed.

She rose and began to search along the arcade which was now almost black. There were doors at intervals but all of them locked. She knocked on each one and waited patiently.

“Oh, heavens, let me get out of this place to-night,” she prayed, lifting her eyes to the stars with an agonized expression. Suddenly, the high mullioned window under which she was standing, glowed with a light just struck. Then, someone opened a casement and a man’s voice called:

“Is anyone there? I thought I heard a cry.”

“I am,” said Molly, trying to stifle the sobs that would rise in her throat. “I’ve been locked in, or rather out.”

“Why, you poor child,” exclaimed the voice again. “Wait a moment and I’ll open the door.”

There were sounds of steps along the passage; a heavy bolt was thrust back and a door held open while Molly rushed into the passage like a frightened bird out of the dark.

“It’s lucky I happened to be in my study this evening,” said the man, leading the way toward a square of light in the dark corridor. “Of course the night watchman would have made his rounds at eight, but an hour’s suspense out there in the cold and dark would have been very disagreeable. How in the world did it happen?”

By this time they had reached the study and Molly found herself in a cozy little room lined from ceiling to floor with books. On the desk was a tray of supper. The owner of the study was a studious looking young man with kindly, quizzical brown eyes under shaggy eyebrows, a firm mouth and a cleft in his chin, which Molly had always heard was a mark of beauty in a woman.

“You must be a freshman?” he said looking at her with a shade of amusement in his eyes.

“I am,” replied Molly, bravely trying to keep her voice from shaking. “I only arrived an hour or so ago. I – I didn’t know they would lock – ” She broke down altogether and slipping into a big wicker chair sobbed bitterly. “Oh, I wish – I wish I’d stayed at home.”

“Why, you poor little girl,” exclaimed the man. “You have had a beastly time for your first day at college, but you’ll come to like it better and better all the time. Come, dry your eyes and I’ll start you on your way to your lodgings. Where are you stopping?”

“Queen’s.”

“Suppose you drink some hot soup before you go. It will warm you up,” he added kindly, taking a cup of hot bouillon from the tray and placing it on the arm of her chair.

“But it’s your supper,” stammered Molly.

“Nonsense, there’s plenty more. Do as I tell you,” he ordered. “I’m a professor, you know, so you’ll have to obey me or I’ll scold.”

Molly drank the soup without a word. It did comfort her considerably and presently she looked up at the professor and said:

“I’m all right now. I hope you’ll excuse me for being so silly and weak. You see I felt so far away and lonesome and it’s an awful feeling to be locked out in the cold about a thousand miles from home. I never was before.”

“I’m sure I should have felt the same in your place,” answered the professor. “I should probably have imagined I saw the ghosts of monks dead and gone, who might have walked there if the Cloisters had been several hundreds of years older, and I would certainly have made the echoes ring with my calls for help. The Cloisters are all right for ‘concentration’ and ‘meditation,’ which I believe is what they are intended to be used for on a warm, sunny day; but they are cold comfort after sunset.”

“Is this your study?” asked Molly, rising and looking about her with interest, as she started toward the door.

“I should say that this was my play room,” he replied, smiling.

“Play room?”

“Yes, this is where I hide from work and begin to play.” He glanced at a pile of manuscript on his desk.

“I reckon work is play and play is work to you,” observed Molly, regarding the papers with much interest. She had never before seen a manuscript.

“If you knew what an heretical document that was, you would not make such rash statements,” said the professor.

“I’m sure it’s a learned treatise on some scientific subject,” laughed Molly, who had entirely regained her composure now, and felt not the least bit afraid of this learned man, with the kind, brown eyes. He seemed quite old to her.

“If I tell you what it is, will you promise to keep it a secret?”

“I promise,” she cried eagerly.

“It’s the libretto of a light opera,” he said solemnly, enjoying her amazement.

“Did you write it?” she asked breathlessly.

“Not the music, but the words and the lyrics. Now, I’ve told you my only secret,” he said. “You must never give me away, or the bottom would fall out of the chair of English literature at Wellington College.”

“I shall never, never tell,” exclaimed Molly; “and thank you ever so much for your kindness to-night.”

They clasped hands and the professor opened the door for her and stood back to let her pass.

Then he followed her down the passage to another door, which he also opened, and in the dim light she still noticed that quizzical look in his eyes, which made her wonder whether he was laughing at her in particular, or at things in general.

“Can you find your way to Queen’s Cottage?” he asked.

“Oh, yes,” she assured him. “It’s the last house on the left of the campus.”

The next moment she found herself running along the deserted Quadrangle walk. Under the archway she flew, and straight across the campus – home.

It was not yet seven o’clock, and the Queen’s Cottage girls were still at supper. A number of students had arrived during the afternoon and the table was full. There were several freshmen; Molly identified them by their silence and looks of unaccustomedness, and some older girls, who were chattering together like magpies.

“Where have you been?” demanded Nance Oldham, who had saved a seat for her roommate next to her own.

All conversation ceased, and every eye in the room was turned on blushing Molly.

“I – I’ve been locked up,” she answered faintly.

“Locked up?” repeated several voices at once. “Where?”

“In the Cloisters. I didn’t realize it was six o’clock, and some one locked the door.”

Molly had been prepared for a good deal of amusement at her expense, and she felt very grateful when, instead of hoots of derision, a nice junior named Sallie Marks, with an interesting face and good dark eyes, exclaimed:

“Why, you poor little freshie! What a mediæval adventure for your first day. And how did you finally get out?”

“One of the professors heard me call and let me out.”

“Which one?” demanded several voices at once.

“I don’t know his name,” replied Molly guardedly, remembering that she had a secret to keep.

“What did he look like?” demanded Frances Andrews, who had been unusually silent for her until now.

“He had brown eyes and a smooth face and reddish hair, and he was middle aged and quite nice,” said Molly glibly.

“What, you don’t mean to say it was Epiménides Antinous Green?”

“Who?” demanded Molly.

“Never mind, don’t let them guy you,” said Sallie Marks. “It was evidently Professor Edwin Green who let you in. He is professor of English literature, and I’ll tell you for your enlightenment that he was nicknamed in a song ‘Epiménides’ after a Greek philosopher, who went to sleep when he was a boy and woke up middle-aged and very wise, and ‘Antinous’ after a very handsome Greek youth. Don’t you think him good-looking?”

“Rather, for an older person,” said Molly thoughtfully.

“He’s not thirty yet, my child,” said Frances Andrews. “At least, so they say, and he’s so clever that two other colleges are after him.”

“And he’s written two books,” went on Sally. “Haven’t you heard of them – ‘Philosophical Essays’ and ‘Lyric Poetry.’”

Molly was obliged to confess her ignorance regarding Professor Edwin Green’s outbursts into literature, but she indulged in an inward mental smile, remembering the lyrics in the comic opera libretto.

“He’s been to Harvard and Oxford, and studied in France. He’s a perfect infant prodigy,” went on another girl.

“It’s a ripping thing for the ‘Squib,’” Molly heard another girl whisper to her neighbor.

She knew she would be the subject of an everlasting joke, but she hoped to live it down by learning immediately everything there was to know about Wellington, and becoming so wise that nobody would ever accuse her again of being a green freshman.

Mrs. Maynard, the matron, came in to see if she was all right. She was a motherly little woman, with a gentle manner, and Molly felt a leaning toward her at once.

“I hope you’ll feel comfortable in your new quarters,” said Mrs. Maynard. “You’ll have plenty of sunshine and a good deal more space when you get your trunks unpacked, although the things inside a trunk do sometimes look bigger than the trunk.”

Molly smiled. There was not much in her trunk to take up space, most certainly. She had nicknamed herself when she packed it “Molly Few Clothes,” and she was beginning to wonder if even those few would pass muster in that crowd of well-dressed girls.

“Oh, have the trunks really come, Miss Oldham?” she asked her roommate.

“Yes, just before supper. I’ve started unpacking mine.”

“Thank goodness. I’ve got an old ham and a hickory nut cake and some beaten biscuits and pickles and blackberry jam in mine, and I can hardly wait to see if anything has broken loose on my clothes, such as they are.”

Nance Oldham opened her eyes wide.

“I’ve always heard that Southern people were pretty strong on food,” she said, “and this proves it.”

“Wait until you try the hickory nut cake, and you won’t be so scornful,” answered Molly, somehow not liking this accusation regarding the appetites of her people.

“Did I hear the words ‘hickory nut cake’ spoken?” demanded Frances Andrews, who apparently talked to no one at the table except freshmen.

“Yes, I brought some. Come up and try it to-night,” said Molly hospitably.

“That would be very jolly, but I can’t to-night, thanks,” said Frances, flushing.

And then Molly and Nance noticed that the other sophomores and juniors at the table were all perfectly silent and looking at her curiously.

“I hope you’ll all come,” she added lamely, wondering if they were accusing her of inhospitality.

“Not to-night, my child,” said Sally Marks, rising from the table. “Thank you, very much.”

As the two freshmen climbed the stairs to their room a little later, they passed by an open door on the landing.

“Come in,” called the voice of Sally. “I was waiting for you to pass. This is my home. How do you like it?”

“Very much,” answered the two girls, really not seeing anything particularly remarkable about the apartment, except perhaps the sign on the door which read “Pax Vobiscum,” and would seem to indicate that the owner of the room had a Christian spirit.

“Your name is ‘Molly Brown,’ and you come from Kentucky, isn’t that so?” asked Sally Marks, taking Molly’s chin in her hand and looking into her eyes.

“And yours?” went on the inquisitive Sally, turning to Molly’s roommate.

“Is Nance Oldham, and I come from Vermont,” finished Nance promptly.

“You’re both dears. And I am ever so glad you are in Queens. You won’t think I’m patronizing if I give you a little advice, will you?”

“Oh, no,” said the two girls.

“You know Wellington’s full of nice girls. I don’t think there is a small college in this country that has such a fine showing for class and brains. But among three hundred there are bound to be some black sheep, and new girls should always be careful with whom they take up.”

“But how can we tell?” asked Nance.

“Oh, there are ways. Suppose, for instance, you should meet a girl who was good-looking, clever, rich, with lots of pretty clothes, and all that, and she seemed to have no friends. What would you think?”

“Why, I might think there was something the matter with her, unless she was too shy to make friends.”

“But suppose she wasn’t?” persisted Sally.

“Then, there would surely be something the matter,” said Nance.

“Well, then, children, if you should meet a girl like that in college, don’t get too intimate with her.”

Sally Marks led them up to their own room, just to see how they were fixed, she said.

Later, when the two girls had crawled wearily into bed, after finishing the unpacking, Molly called out sleepily:

“Nance” – she had forgotten already to say Miss Oldham – “do you suppose that nice junior could have meant Miss Andrews?”

“I haven’t a doubt of it,” said Nance.

“Just the same, I’m sorry for the poor thing,” continued Molly. “I’m sorry for anybody who’s walking under a cloud, and I don’t think it would do any harm to be nice to her.”

“It wouldn’t do her any harm,” said Nance.

“Epiménides Antinous Green,” whispered Molly to herself, as she snuggled under the covers. The name seemed to stick in her memory like a rhyme. “Funny I didn’t notice how young and handsome he was. I only noticed that he had good manners, if he did treat me like a child.”