Chapter XIII: On the Ice

There was a great crowd on the lake. It was perfect skating weather, and every one who had skates and could use them, had come to enjoy the advantage of the first real ice of the season. The banks were thronged with onlookers, and it was a great inspiration to the expert ones to know that their performances would be watched and commended by such an audience as this.

"Goodness, girls! Did you ever see such a crush?" asked Louie feverishly, hurrying her pace, as she, Nan, and Ruth neared the spot.

"There won't be room to move," announced Nan, adding with a laugh, "much less to fall down in."

"All the better for me! I'll put on my skates and let the crowd push me round. I'm never too sure of myself, but in a crush like this, one can't go over, so I'm saved a heap of worry!" cried Ruth with a jolly laugh.

Nan's skates were on in a twinkling, and she longed with all her heart to be off and away. But the sight of poor Louie, struggling vainly with her refractory straps, kept her back.

"Oh, do hurry," urged Ruth excitedly.

"Did you ever see such contrary things?" gasped Louie, her cheeks crimson with cold, and the exertion of bending double in her fur jacket.

"Give them to me; I'll get them on in a jiffy," and Nan was down on her knees and the skates secured before Louie had even time to thank her with a look.

"Now, do come on!" cried Ruth, fairly dancing with eagerness.

"Oh, wait! wait! Please wait!" pleaded Louie. "This is the first time I've been on the ice this year, and I feel so nervous I could scream."

John Gardiner spun past with a nod and a flourish, but a moment later wheeled about and came skimming up to where they were standing, saying briskly:

"Jolly day, isn't it? Ice in first-rate shape, too. Too many people, but after a few of them get tired out it will be all right. Don't suppose they'd care to stand aside and let us show them what skating is, eh, Nan?"

Nan laughed. "Perhaps they wouldn't like the figures we'd cut. I'm not sure I would myself. Pride goes before a fall, and I'd rather be a bit humble and keep on my feet."

"As though you'd ever take a tumble," cried the young fellow with great scorn. "Oh, I say, come along and let's do a turn or two, as we did on the Steamer last year. Don't you remember what a rousing cheer we got? Let's try it again."

For an instant Nan's blood leaped. She liked to do daring things, and she loved applause. John Gardiner was as much at home on his skates as she was on hers, and they were singularly at ease together. Moreover, way down in her heart was a sort of lurking pride at being especially chosen by this favorite among the "fellows" and being seen with him in his attractive suit and his graceful "Norwegians" that were the envy and admiration of all the other fellows in town. It certainly was a temptation, and for a moment Nan yielded to it. Then she looked at Louie's anxious face and shook her head.

"I'm heaps obliged," she said. "But I guess I'd better not to-day. It wasn't much harm at the Steamer, for there was no crowd there to speak of; but here it's so public, I'm afraid it wouldn't look well."

John threw back his head and laughed.

"As if you cared how things look!" he cried, frankly.

Nan's cheeks reddened furiously. She looked down and drew a figure on the ice with the tip of her skate. Her confusion could not escape him, and he caught himself up instantly. "I mean, you've always been so sensible, you know. You haven't cared for tattle or nonsense. That's what's made us like you so. A fellow hasn't had to be on the continual jump for fear your hat wasn't on straight or your hair was coming down. You're as plucky as a boy, and it's like having another jolly, good fellow about when you're around. You're not going back on all that? You aren't going to turn girly-girly? You aren't going to be a Nancy, are you?"

She lifted her head with a jerk. "No; I'm going to stay plain Nan," she retorted. "But I can't go out with you this morning, John--at least not now. Later I may take a turn if you're willing."

He saw that there was no shaking her resolution, and turned away with a frown and a sigh.

"Very well. If you won't, you won't. I'll look you up by and by, though, and maybe you'll have changed your mind by then," and he was off like a flash, his flying feet seeming scarcely to touch the ice, and his long, curved, glistening skates flashing back the sunlight from their dazzling nickel blades.

Louie clutched Nan's arm. "Oh, I'm so glad you didn't go!" she said, agitatedly. "I'm all of a tremble, and I'm sure I'll slip if you don't hold on to me."

So Nan held on to her, and slowly piloted her this way and that, urging her gently to strike out alone, and patiently waiting until she had the courage to try. Ruth darted hither and thither, minding it as little when she went down herself as when she was the cause of others doing so, and always skating with an awkward energy that was refreshing to behold.

"O Nan!" panted Louie, "how did you learn?"

"By getting up whenever I fell down," declared Nan, succinctly.

Ruth came toward them with arms flying like windmills.

"O girls!" she gasped; but just here her feet went from under her, and she sat squarely upon the ice with a great plump. "O girls!" she repeated, not a bit abashed and without trying to get up, "Mary Brewster and Grace are over there, and they just asked John to take them out--at least Mary did--and he said he was ever so sorry, but his 'card was full,' and they are simply furious."

"Get up!" commanded Nan, with lips that would twitch in spite of her efforts to control them. "You'll catch your death of cold!"

Ruth grasped her outstretched hand and struggled to her feet. "How are you getting on, Lu?" she asked, shaking the snow from her skirts.

"I think I'm doing a little better. Don't you, Nan?" appealed Louie, tremulously.

"Why, yes. You'll skate as well as any one after you've once gained courage," Nan returned cheerfully, and took up the slow, tedious task again of steering her laboriously this way and that, Louie meanwhile clinging to her arm and uttering little panic-stricken shrieks that irritated Nan beyond measure. No one could conceive how hard it was for the girl not to desert her clinging companion. She knew in her heart that Louie would never master the knack unless she were made to rely upon herself. As long as she could depend on Nan's support she would not make any effort to use her own energy, nor would she exert her will-power to force herself to strike out alone. The ice was in perfect condition to-day, but it would not long remain so with such a crowd cutting it to pieces, and the sun already thawing the powdered snow and threatening to do more damage to-morrow. If Nan lost her chance now she might not have another so good in weeks to come, for the weather was always uncertain and the holidays were short. Everything seemed to urge her to break loose from her self-imposed martyrdom and go her way rejoicing; the crisp air that sang in her ears and filled her with a sense of glorious exhilaration; the shimmering sunlight on the ice that seemed to scud before her and invite her to join in the race; the knowledge that she was in reality doing Louie a doubtful service by staying beside her, and, last of all, the look of disappointment in John's eyes as he shot past them at intervals, and saw that Nan was not yet ready to capitulate. A sort of war with herself was waging in her mind; her sense of duty against her preferences; her long established habits against her newly found resolutions. She had resolved to be like other girls in the future. It was like headlong, impulsive Nan to make a resolve like this, and never stop to realize that it was only the exaggeration of herself that proved objectionable; that it would be as impossible for her to be sedate and silent and serious as for a dashing dandelion to become a dainty buttercup.

To her it seemed as if Miss Blake and the rest--were demanding of her just such a metamorphosis and she had been trying--she really had--to recast herself in the mold she thought they exacted. And now here came John Gardiner, surely the nicest and most mannerly young fellow she knew, and the one whom even Miss Blake was pleased to call "a perfect gentleman"--here came John Gardiner, and told her that her despised characteristics were precisely the ones that made her valuable. She shook her head. It was no use; she could not understand.

"O Nan!" cried Louie, shunting along clumsily by her side and clutching her arm in desperation. "Won't you please get me over to the shore? I'm all tired out. I guess I'll go in for a bit and warm up and get rested, and then I'll come out again, may be, and take another try."

Nan assented with alacrity.

"You've made a pretty good beginning," she said with new encouragement in her voice.

"Oh, it's always the same!" wailed Louie. "Year before last I got so I could do it quite respectably, and then last year I had to learn all over again. I really thought I'd pick it up where I left off this year, but you see how it is! The very sight of the ice when I'm on skates makes me quake."

"Just force yourself to do it and you'll be surprised to see how soon you'll be skimming all over creation," advised Nan, as she unfastened her friend's skates and saw her start stiffly up the path to the Lodge.

Her heart gave a bound as she realized that she was at last alone and untrammeled. She pulled her Russian cap well into place, thrust her hands deep into her pockets, and set out for the middle of the lake, her lithe young body swaying gently forward as she was carried this way and that by her gliding feet. She looked about for John, but he was nowhere to be seen, and she concluded that he had given up expecting her and had either gone home or joined other friends. Ruth was forging about after her own peculiar fashion, getting in every one's way and under every one's feet, and enjoying it all immensely. She was perfectly self-reliant, and Nan did not feel that there was any necessity of offering assistance or even companionship to such a self-sufficient, resolute maiden, and so she set about enjoying her independence with a clear conscience. A moment later she had forgotten everything but the keen delight of the delicious exercise; the fresh current of air upon her cheeks; the sense of flashing through space "without any appreciable effort; the knowledge of her mastery of the art. She had not a shadow of fear. Instead, she felt a sort of wild exultation in her own daring, and set about doing difficult feats with an added delight in the very risk of the thing. Suddenly a shadow shot toward her from the back, caught her by the arm and went flying forward, suiting his rhythm to hers in an instant.

"Oh! heyo, John! I thought you'd gone home!" said Nan.

"Not a bit of it. Think I'd leave the ice when it's as prime as this? Not much. What under the canopy have you been about all this time? Toting Lou Hawes around when you ought to be making the best of the rarest chance you'll get this season, maybe?"

"Oh, that's all right," rejoined Nan in a matter-of-fact way. "I liked to do it--for a change. And she's a little timid."

"Well now, you're free, let's have a couple of extra good turns just to make up for lost time," and he took her hand and started off on a fine, free swing, Nan gliding beside him in such perfect accord that it seemed as if one impulse moved them both. They swung apart rejoined, and swung apart again. Then, dropping her hand John gave a curving glide to the right which took him a pace ahead of her, and she, repeating his movement, but toward the left, passed easily before him on the other side, so on and on in a sort of progressive chain, until at a sign they sped backward, reversing the order in which they had come, and reached the starting point and circled round it, clasping crossed hands and chatting gayly the while.

John saw that they had already attracted some attention, and it only made his pulses quicken. He also saw that Nan was oblivious to everything, but the mere delight of what she was doing, and he did not think it worth while to remind her that this was not the Steamer, and that if she wished to be inconspicuous, as she had suggested, she would better limit herself strictly to a commonplace gait. Instead he bent toward her, and said in a quick, low undertone, "I'll bet a quarter you've forgotten how to cut your name."

"Oh, have I?" cried Nan, the spur pricking sharply at her pride. "Want to see me do it?" and off she went accordingly, accomplishing the difficult figure without a thought of hesitation, and returning to his side laughing and triumphant.

"Now the spiral! Forward! Left foot first! Now right! Combination!"

John gave the directions in a sort of tense whisper. He was mortally afraid Nan would become conscious, and see what was going on about her. But he might have spared himself the trouble. She was absolutely blind to the crowd that had gathered about them, and all the commendation she was aware of was that which he gave her in a murmured "Good!" or "Fine!"

A wide circle had been cleared for them, and in it they and one or two other hardy souls were exhibiting their prowess, while the throng outside whispered and applauded and made comments on the different skaters and their respective skill and grace.

"There! That's the serpentine he's doing now! Isn't it pretty?"

"It must be frightfully hard to go backward like that!"

"I should think he'd fall on his head!"

"Look! See! She's starting off again! Doesn't she do it well?"

"Who is she, anyway?"

Nan had completed her figure, and was waiting at the edge of the circle for John to finish his and to come and join her. She stood well back, so that she might not interfere with the others, and thus it was that she was waked from her trance with an abrupt shock by the sound of two whispering voices, seeming almost at her ear, their murmur carried so in the chill, crystal air.

"Didn't I tell you she was a bold thing?"

"Sh! She'll hear you! She's right in front of us--only those men between."

"No she won't, either. We're too far away. Didn't I tell you Lu's and Ruth's friendship was for one night only? I knew well enough why Lu asked her to come. Any one could see through that. She wants to learn how to skate, and this was as ready a way as any to be taught, and she jumps at the chance."

"Oh, do hush! She'll hear!"

"Don't care if she does. I don't know what your opinion is, but mine is that it's positively brazen of her to do such things before a crowd like this. Dragging John Gardiner into it, too! It's a disgrace!"

"Sh, please! There he comes!"

Nan pulled herself wearily forward a step or two to meet him.

"I say, what's up? What's the matter?" he demanded anxiously, looking into her face and seeing the change it had undergone.

"Nothing! Nothing!" she reassured him quickly. "I'm tired, that's all. And I didn't realize these people were watching us. Let's get out of this. I hate the way they stare. I want to go home."

John took her by the elbow and steered for the bank.

"Won't you find Grace and Louie first? You came with them, didn't you? They won't know what's become of you."

"I don't care! I want to go home!" she repeated irritably.

They sped forward silently, and in a moment had reached the shore. Nan trembled so as she tried to unfasten her skates that John pushed her hands aside and made her submit to having him assist her.

"You've caught cold!" he said remorsefully, "I was a brute to keep urging you on. But I didn't dream you were tired. You looked so bright and well."

"I'm not tired. I haven't caught cold!" said Nan. "Don't bother about me, please. Go back and finish up your skate!"

"Thank you kindly, ma'am," rejoined he, removing his own skates. "But I've finished it up already," and he grasped her arm and tramped her off in the direction of the Park entrance with vigorous steps.

"Won't Lou and Ruth wonder?" he ventured again after a moment of silence.

"No! They don't care!" cried Nan, dismally.

"The mischief they don't!" and John gave vent to an exclamation of disbelief. "Why, Ruth was only telling me half an hour ago how good and generous you were, and Louie caught me in the Lodge and went into regular spasms over you. You're the patientest, the generousest--everythingelse-est girl she knows. I had actually to tear myself away from her raptures when I saw that you were free of her and could take a turn with me."

Nan shook her head.

"No, you're wrong, John!" she said hopelessly. "They don't like me. None of them do. It's no use. I thought Christmas eve I might make them, perhaps--but I give it up. I'm too--different!"

"Now, see here, Nan!" cried John, stopping suddenly in the middle of the path and confronting her squarely, "this change of base has come on you all of a sudden. You weren't in such a state before. You've seen something or heard something that's given you a turn. Say now, haven't you, honestly?"

Nan gulped and nodded grimly.

"I thought so. Well, now, you say you're different from the other girls, and so you are in most ways, but just at present you're doing the silliest trick I know. Going off by yourself and making people miserable all around. Do you know what a fellow would do in your place? Why, he'd go straight to the man he'd heard or seen back-biting him and he'd make him come out fair and square and own up--or shut up. 'You pays your money and you takes your choice.' That's what a fellow would do. But girls prefer to be martyrs and go about 'letting concealment prey upon their damask cheeks' and all that namby-pamby nonsense. Pshaw! I wouldn't give a rush for a girl's courage. It's all humbug."

"It isn't any such thing!" cried Nan, hastening to defend her sex. "It isn't because I'm afraid that I don't go straight up to the--the person. It's because I have too much pride. I wouldn't demean myself by letting her know I care."

"Oh, fudge! Pride! I like that! Care? Why, whoever she is, she can see that, anyhow, with half an eye. It's as plain as preaching. You came with Lu and Ruth, and were as gay and jolly as could be. Then, all of a sudden, you turn grumpy and want to go home, and say Lu and Ruth don't like you. The explanation of that is simple enough. You've heard some one saying something about you, or pretending to repeat something Lu and Ruth have said about you. There! Now haven't I hit the nail on the head?"

Nan made no reply.

"I wager I have, though," continued the young fellow, watching her closely, and drawing many of his conclusions from the evidence of her tell-tale face. "And I'd be ashamed, even if I were a girl, to let myself be worried by a thing like that. Besides, it isn't fair to Lu and Ruth. You ought to give them a chance to set themselves straight. You've no right to believe things of them till you've their own word for it that it's true. Give them a chance, and if they act queer you can throw them over."

"But I can't ask them," burst out Nan. "It wasn't anything they said. It was about the way they feel, and if I give them a chance they may throw me over."

John laughed. "True for you. They may. But anyway, you'd have done the just thing. Whatever they did to you, you'd have played fair."

Nan thought a moment. Suddenly she turned on her heel and began to retrace her steps. "I'm going back," she said, stoutly, "to find Lu and Ruth! and--and--give them that chance."

"There! Now you're behaving like an honest man," announced John, with gusto. "One can't afford to be too perpendicular."

But before they had taken a dozen steps they came upon the two girls themselves, running breathlessly toward them.

"O Nan!" panted Louie. "What is the matter? Are you sick? Are you hurt? We couldn't find you anywhere!"

"We looked all over and got terribly nervous, and at last Mary Brewster told us you had gone home," Ruth broke in, gaspingly.

"She said John had taken you, and that you kind of walked as if you were dizzy or something. We've run all the way! Do say, are you sick?" pleaded Louie.

"Or hurt?" articulated Ruth.

John and Nan regarded each other solemnly for a moment. Then they both broke into a peal of laughter. Nan was the first to speak.

"No, I'm not sick and I wasn't hurt--the way you mean. I was a goose--that's all. I want you to forgive me."

"What for?" demanded the girls, in a breath.

"Why, for--for--making you run after me," replied Nan.