Chapter XXII: Clouds and Sunshine

The day following Thanksgiving that year would ever be known as "Black Friday" in the annals of Milton school history. And it came about like this.

Professor Ware had given notice the Saturday previous that there would be two rehearsals on that day of _The Carnation Countess_. The morning rehearsal was for the choruses, the dance numbers and tableaux, and especially for those halting Thespians whom the professor called "lame ducks"--those who had such difficulty in learning their parts.

The afternoon rehearsal was the first full rehearsal--every actor, both amateur and professional, must be present, and the play was to be run through from the first note of the overture to the final curtain. For the first time the scholars would hear the orchestral arrangement of the music score.

And right at the start--at the beginning of the morning rehearsal--the musical director was balked. Innocent Delight was not present.

"What's the matter with that girl?" demanded the irate professor of everybody in general and nobody in particular. "Was Thanksgiving too much for her? I expected some of you boys would perform gastronomic feats to make the angels tremble. But girls!"

"The Severns went down to Pleasant Cove over Thanksgiving. They haven't got home yet," announced a neighbor of the missing Trix.

"What? Gone out of town? And after all I said about the importance of to-day's rehearsals!" exclaimed the director. "This is no time for a part as important as that of Innocent Delight to be read."

But they had to go on with the play in that halting manner. Trix Severn's lines were read; but her absence spoiled the action of each scene in which she should have appeared.

"But goodness knows!" snapped Eva Larry, who, with the rest of the "penitent sisterhood," as Neale called them, watched the rehearsal, "Trix will spoil the play anyway. But won't she get it when she comes this afternoon?"

The play halted on to the bitter end. The amateur performers grew tired; the director grew fussy. His sarcastic comments toward the end did not seem to inspire the young folk to a spirited performance of their parts. They were discouraged.

"We should announce this on the bills as a burlesque of _The Carnation Countess_," declared Professor Ware, "and as nothing else. Milton people will laugh us out of town."

The girls and teachers in the audience realized even better than the performers just how bad it was. The little folk were excused, for they had all done well, while the director tried his best to whip the others into some sort of shape for the afternoon session.

"I know very well that Madam Shaw will refuse to sing her part with a background of such blunderers!" exclaimed Professor Ware, bitterly, at the last. "Nor will the other professionals be willing to risk their reputations, and the play itself, in such a performance. Our time has gone for nothing. And if Innocent Delight does not appear for the afternoon performance----"

His futile threats made little impression upon the girls and boys. They were--for the time--exhausted. Ruth went home in tears--although she had not drawn one word or look of critical comment from the sharp-spoken director. Tess was very solemn, and continued to repeat her part of Swiftwing over and over to herself--although she knew it perfectly.

Dot danced along, saying: "Well! I don't care! _I buzzed_ all right--I know I did! Buzz! buzz! buzz-z-z-z!"

"Goodness gracious!" ejaculated the nervous Agnes, who felt for them all, though not having a thing to do with the play---- "Goodness gracious! you were wishing for a 'buzzer,' Dot Kenway. I don't think you need one. Nature must have made a mistake and meant you for a bee, anyway. I don't see how you ever came to be born into the Kenway family, instead of a bee-hive!"

Dot pouted at that, but quickly changed her expression when she saw Sammy Pinkney careering along the street like a young whirlwind. Sammy, for his sins, had been forbidden to participate in _The Carnation Countess_--not that it seemed to trouble him a bit! Anything that occurred in the schoolhouse was trial and tribulation to Master Pinkney. They could not fool him into believing differently, just by calling it a "play!"

"Oh, bully! bully! bully!" he sang, coming along the street in a "hop, skip and a jump pace," the better to show his joy. "Oh, Dot! oh, Tess! you never can guess what's happened."

"Something _awful_, I just know," said Tess, "or you wouldn't be so glad."

"Huh!" grunted Sammy, stopping in the middle of his fantastic dance, and glaring at the next to the youngest Corner House girl, "You wait, Tess Kenway! You're 'teacher's pet'; but nobody else likes old Pepperpot. I guess it will be in the paper to-night, and everybody will be glad of it."

"What has happened to Miss Pepperill?" demanded Ruth, seeing into the mystery of the boy's speech--at least, for a little way.

"Then you _ain't_ heard?" crowed Sammy.

"And we're not likely to, if you don't hurry up and say something," snapped Agnes.

"Well!" growled Sammy. "She's hurt-ed. She was run down by an automobile on High Street. They wanted to take her to the hospital--the one for girls and babies, you know----"

"Oh! Mrs. Eland's hospital!" gasped Tess.

"Yep. But she wouldn't go there. They say she made 'em take her to her boarding house. And she's hurt bad. And, oh, goody! there won't be any school Monday!" cried the young savage, beginning to dance again.

"Don't you fool yourself!" exclaimed Agnes, for Tess was crying frankly, and Dot had a finger in her mouth. "Don't you fool yourself, Sammy Pinkney! They'll have plenty of time to find a substitute teacher before school opens on Monday."

"Oh, they _won't_!" wailed the boy.

"Yes they will. And I hope it will be somebody a good deal worse than Miss Pepperill. So there!"

"Oh, but there _ain't_ nobody worse," said Sammy, with conviction, while Tess looked at her older sister with tearful surprise.

"Why, Aggie!" she said sorrowfully. "I hope you don't mean that. 'Cause I've got to go to school Monday as well as Sammy."

Tess was really much disturbed over the news of Miss Pepperill's injury. She would not wait for luncheon but went straight over to the house where her teacher boarded, and inquired for her.

The red-haired, sharp-tongued lady was really quite badly hurt. There was a compound fracture of the leg, and Dr. Forsyth feared some injury to the brain, for Miss Pepperill's head was seriously cut. Tess learned that they had been obliged to shave off all the teacher's red, red hair!

"And that's awful!" she told Dot, on her return. "For goodness only knows what color it will be when it grows out again. Miss Lippit (she's the landlady where Miss Pepperill boards) showed it to me. And it's beautiful, long, long hair."

"Mebbe it will come out like Mrs. MacCall's--pepper-and-salt color," said Dot, reflectively. "We haven't got a pepper-and-salt teacher in school, have we?"

Such light reflections as this did not please Tess. She really forgot to repeat the part of Swiftwing, the hummingbird, in her anxiety about the injured Miss Pepperill.

At two o'clock the big rehearsal was called.

"I don't believe I will go back with you," Agnes said, to Ruth. "I can't sit there and hear Trix murder that part. Oh, dear!"

"I bet you won't ever eat any more strawberries," chuckled Neale, who had come over the back fence of the Corner House premises, that being his nearest way to school.

"Don't speak to me of them!" cried Agnes. "A piece of Mrs. MacCall's strawberry shortcake would give me the colic, I know--_just to look at it_!"

"Oh, you'll get all over that before the strawberry season comes around again," her older sister said placidly. "You'd better come, Aggie."

"No."

"Oh, yes, Aggie, do come!" urged Neale. "Be a sport. Come and see and hear us slaughter _The Carnation Countess_. It'll be more fun than moping here alone."

"Well, I'll just cover my eyes and ears when Innocent Delight comes on," Agnes declared.

But Trix was not at the rehearsal. Information from the Severn house revealed the fact that the family was still at Pleasant Cove. It was evident that Trix's interest in _The Carnation Countess_ had flagged.

Professor Ware gathered the principal professionals around him. His speech was serious. They had given the performance in several cities and large towns, and had whipped into shape some very unpromising material; but the director admitted that he was discouraged with the outlook here.

"I am inclined to say right here and now: Give it up. Not that the children as a whole do not average as high in quality as those of other schools; but the talent is lacking to take the amateur parts which have always been assigned to the girls and boys. The girls' parts are especially weak.

"One or two bad parts might be ignored--overlooked by a friendly audience. But here is this Innocent Delight girl, not here at all at the most important rehearsal we have had. And she is _awful_ in her part, anyway; I admit it.

"I was misinformed regarding her. I received a note before the parts were given out, stating that she had had much experience in amateur theatricals. I do not believe that she ever even acted in parlor charades," added the professor, in disgust. "She must have a friendly letter-writer who is a professional booster.

"Well, it is too late to change such a part, I am afraid. But to read her lines this afternoon, all through the play, will cripple us terribly. Even if she is a stick, she can look the part, and walk through it."

Somebody tugged at the professor's sleeve. When he looked around he saw a flaxen-haired boy with a very eager face.

"I say, Professor! there's a girl here that knows Trix Severn's part better than she does herself."

"What's this? Another booster?" demanded the director, sorrowfully.

"Just try her! She knows it all by heart. And she's a blonde."

"Why haven't I seen her before, if she's so good? Is she in the chorus?" demanded the doubtful professor.

"She hasn't had any part in the play at all--yet," declared Neale O'Neil, banking all upon this chance for Agnes. "But you just try her out!"

"She knows the lines?"

"Perfectly," declared the boy, earnestly.

He dared say no more, but he watched the professor's face sharply.

"I don't suppose she can do any more harm than the other," muttered the desperate director. "Send her up here, boy. Odd I should not have known there was an understudy for Innocent Delight."

Neale went down to the row of seats in which Agnes and a few of the "penitent sisterhood" sat. "Say!" he said, grinning at Agnes and whispering into her pretty ear, "Now's your chance to show us what you can do."

"What do you mean, Neale O'Neil?" she gasped.

"The professor is looking for somebody to walk through Trix's part--just for this rehearsal, of course."

"Oh, Neale!" exclaimed the Corner House girl, clasping her hands. "They'd never let me do it."

"I don't believe you can," laughed Neale. "But you can try if you want to. He told me to send you up to him. There he stands on the stage now."

Agnes rose up giddily. At first she felt that she could not stand. Everything seemed whirling about her. Neale, with his past experience of the circus in his mind, had an uncanny appreciation of her feelings.

"Buck up!" he whispered. "Don't have stage-fright. You don't have to say half the words if you don't want to."

She flashed him a wonderful look. Her vision cleared and she smiled. Right there and then Agnes, by some subtle power that had been given her when she was born into this world, became changed into the character of Innocent Delight--the part which she had already learned so well.

She had sat here throughout each rehearsal and listened to Professor Ware's comments and the stage manager's instructions. She knew the cues perfectly. There was not an inflection or pose in the part that she had not perfected her voice and body in. The other girls watched her move toward the stage curiously--Neale with a feeling that he had never really known his little friend before.

"Hello, who's this?" asked one of the male professionals when Agnes came to the group upon the stage.

"The very type!" breathed Madam Shaw, who had just come upon the platform in her street costume. "Professor! why did you not get _this_ girl for Innocent Delight?"

"I have," returned the director, drily. "You are the one who has studied the part?" he asked Agnes.

"Yes, sir," she said, and all her bashfulness left her.

"Open your first scene," commanded the professor, bruskly.

The command might have confused a professional--especially when the player had had no opportunity of rehearsing save in secret. But Agnes had forgotten everything but the character she was to play. She opened her lips and began with a vivacity and dash that made the professionals smile and applaud when she was through.

"Wait!" commanded the professor, immediately. "If you can do that as well in the play----"

"Oh! but, sir," said Agnes, suddenly coming to herself, and feeling her heart and courage sink. "I can't act in the play--not really."

"Why not?" he snapped.

"I am forbidden."

"By whom, I'd like to know?"

"Mr. Marks. We girls of the basket ball team cannot act. It is a punishment."

"Indeed?" said the director, grimly. "And are all the girls Mr. Marks sees fit to punish at this special time, as able as you are to take part?"

"Ye-yes, sir," quavered Agnes.

"Well!" It was a most expressive observation. But the director said nothing further about Mr. Marks and his discipline. He merely turned and cried:

"Ready for the first act! Clear the stage."

To Madam Shaw he whispered: "Of course, one swallow doesn't make a summer."

"But one good, smart girl like this one may come near to saving the day for you, Professor."