The Girls of Central High on the Stage/Chapter 11
CHAPTER XI
MISSING
Alice Long, who was Short and Long's sister, was entertaining some of the girls when Jess Morse came into the recreation hall with something her little brother Tommy had said.
"Tommy's just going to school, you know, and he's beginning to ask questions. I guess he stumps his teachers in the primary grade. He heard the arithmetic class reciting and learned that only things of the same denomination can be subtracted from each other.
"'Now, you know that ain't so, Alice,' says he to me. 'For, can't you take four quarts of milk from three cows?'"
Jess didn't feel like laughing; what was coming after recess troubled her. She felt a certainty that she would fail, and she could not get over it.
"Besides," she said to herself, "Gee Gee will put the hardest questions on the list to me—I just know she will."
"What's the matter, Jess?" asked Laura, coming up to her and squeezing her arm. "Something is troubling you, honey."
"And it will trouble you after recess," replied Jess, mournfully.
"The old exams?"
"Uh-huh!"
"Afraid, are you?" laughed Mother Wit.
"I'm just scared to death. And Gee Gee knows I'm not prepared and she will be down on me like a hawk."
"Maybe not."
"She knows I am weak. She just told me so, and she showed me the papers and said there were awfully hard questions in them. She just delights in catching us girls. And she says all of us who are trying for the prize are neglecting our regular work."
"I expect we are, Jess," admitted Laura. "Oh, dear! it's not easy to write a play, is it?"
"I don't know," said Jess, hesitatingly. "I'm not sure that I am writing a regular play. But I'm writing something!"
"What does your mother say about it?"
"Oh, of course she praises it. She would."
"I bet you win the prize, Jess!" exclaimed Laura.
"No such luck. And, anyway, I will take no prize this afternoon. Gee Gee threatens to take my standing up with Mr. Sharp if I don't do well, too."
"Oh, don't worry, dear. Perhaps you will come out all right."
Bobby came swinging along and bumped into them. "Oh, hullo!" exclaimed she. "Say! how do you pronounce 's-t-i-n-g-y'? Heh?"
"Man or wasp?" returned Mother Wit, quickly.
Jess laughed. "You can't catch Laura with your stale jokes, Bobby," she gibed.
"That's all right; I asked for information. But you girls don't know anything. You're writing plays. That's enough to give you softening of the brain. The folks that know it all are the squabs," chuckled Boboby, referring to the freshman class. "What do you suppose one of them sprang this morning?"
"I haven't the least idea," spoke Laura.
"Why, she was asked to define the difference between instinct and intelligence, and she said: 'Instinct knows everything needed without learning it; but human beings have reason, so we have to study ourselves half blind to keep from being perfect fools!' Now, what do you know about that?"
"I believe that child was right," sighed Jess. "If I only had instinct I wouldn't have to worry about the questions Gee Gee is going to give us this afternoon."
"Oh, say not so!" gasped Bobby, rolling her eyes and putting up both hands. "I am trying to forget about those exams There's the bell! Back to the mines!" she groaned, and rushed to take her place in the line.
The Junior class crowded into Miss Carrington's room and took their seats. The examination covered several of the more important studies. The teacher took her place, adjusted the thick glasses she always wore, and looked sternly over the room.
"Young ladies," she said, in her most severe manner, "I hope you are all prepared for the review. But I doubt it—I seriously doubt it. Some of you have been falling behind of late in a most astonishing manner, and I fear for your standing—I fear for it."
This manner of approaching the exam, was, of course, very soothing to the nervous girls; but it was Gee Gee's way and they should all have been used to it by this time. She had opened the drawer of her desk—the top right-hand drawer—and was fumbling in it.
Pretty soon she gave her entire attention to sorting the papers in this drawer, which seemed to be pretty full. As the moments passed, her manner betrayed the fact that the teacher was much disturbed.
"Oh! I hope she's lost 'em!" exclaimed the wicked Bobby Hargrew.
"I don't," returned the girl she spoke to. "We'd suffer for it."
"Well, I got my fingers crossed!" chuckled Bobby. "She can't accuse me. I wasn't near her old desk."
"Wasn't it locked?" whispered another of the waiting girls.
Miss Carrington heard the bustle in the class, so she sat up and looked out over the room with asperity.
"I want to know what this means, girls," she said, snappily. "My desk was left open by chance while I was out of the room for perhaps ten minutes. The examination papers were in this drawer. Now I cannot find them. Has somebody done this for a joke?" and she looked hard in Bobby's direction.
"Look out, Bob," warned one of her mates; "crossing your fingers isn't going to save you."
But suddenly, even while she was speaking, Miss Carrington seemed to be stabbed by a thought. She started to her feet and turned her gaze upon the part of the room in which Josephine Morse sat. And Jess's face was aflame!
"Miss Morse!"
Gee Gee's voice was never of a pleasing quality. Now it startled every girl in the room. Jess slowly arose, and she clung to the corner of her desk a moment for support.
"Do you remember seeing me put those question papers into this drawer? Do you?" demanded the teacher.
"Ye—yes, ma'am," replied Jess.
"You were standing right here at my desk?"
Jess nodded, while the whole class watched her now paling face. Many of the girls looked amazed; some few looked angry. Laura Belding's eyes fairly blazed and she half rose from her seat.
"Sit down, young ladies!" commanded Miss Carrington, who was quick to see these suggestive actions on the part of the class. "Come here to me, Miss Morse."
Jess walked up the aisle. After that first moment her strength came back and she held her head up and stared straight into the face of the teacher. The tears that had sprung to her eyes she winked back.
"I had called you to my desk, Miss Morse," said Gee Gee, in a low voice, and staring hard at the girl, "and had pointed out to you that this particular examination would be a trying one. Is that not a fact?"
"Yes, ma'am," admitted Jess.
"Miss Gould called me and I hastily thrust the papers, which I particularly told you were the question papers, into this drawer. Did I not?"
"You did."
"And then I hurried out of the room without locking the drawer—without pulling down the roll top of the desk, indeed. Is that not so, Miss Morse?"
"It is," said Jess, getting better control of her voice now.
"And you were left standing here. The other girls were gone. Now, Miss Morse, I freely admit that I am culpable in leaving such important papers in the way. I should have locked them up. I presume the temptation was great"
"I beg your pardon, Miss Carrington!" exclaimed the girl, more indignant than frightened now. "You are accusing me without reason. I would not do such a thing"
"Not ordinarily, perhaps," interposed Miss Carrington. "But it all came to you in a moment, I presume. And you did not have time to put them back."
This she had said in a low voice, so that nobody but Jess heard her. But the girl's voice rose higher as she grew hysterical.
"Miss Carrington, you are unfair! I never touched them!"
"You must admit, Miss Morse, that circumstances are very much against you," declared the teacher.
"I admit nothing of the kind. A dozen people might have been in the room while you were out and the desk was open. Ten minutes is a long time."
"You seem to have thought out your defense very well, Miss Morse," said Gee Gee, sternly. "But it will not do. It is too serious a matter to overlook. I shall send for Mr. Sharp," and she touched the button which rang the bell in the principal's office.