We had 'lived it down,' just as I hope we should.
That is much better than having it contradicted."
"I don't think so; and I should enjoy seeing that little wretch of a Bella well whipped," persisted Rose.
But Katy was not to be shaken.
"To please me, promise that not a word shall be said about it," she urged; and, to please her, the girls consented.
I think Katy was right in saying that Mrs. Nipson no longer believed her guilty in the affair of the note. She had been very friendly to both the sisters of late; and when Clover carried in her album and asked for an autograph, she waxed quite sentimental and wrote,
"I would not exchange the modest Clover for the most beautiful parterre, so bring it back, I pray thee, to your affectionate teacher, Marianne Nipson;" which effusion quite overwhelmed "the modest Clover," and called out the remark from Rose,—"Don't she wish she may get you!"
Miss Jane said twice,
"I shall miss you, Katy," a speech which, to quote Rose again, made Katy look as "surprised as Balaam."
Rose herself was not coming back to school.
She and the girls were half broken-hearted at parting.
They lavished tears, kisses, promises of letters, and vows of eternal friendship.
Neither of them, it was agreed, was ever to love anybody else so well.
The final moment would have been almost too tragical, had it not been for a last bit of mischief on the part of Rose.
It was after the stage was actually at the door, and she had her foot upon the step, that, struck by a happy thought, she rushed upstairs again, collected the girls, and, each taking a window, they tore down the cotton, flung open sashes, and startled Mrs. Nipson, who stood below, by the simultaneous waving therefrom of many white flags.
Katy, who was already in the stage, had the full benefit of this performance. Always after that, when she thought of the Nunnery, her memory recalled this scene,—Mrs. Nipson in the door-way, Bella blubbering behind, and overhead the windows crowded with saucy girls, laughing and triumphantly flapping the long cotton strips which had for so many months obscured the daylight for them all.
At Springfield next morning she and Clover said good-by to Mr. Page and Lilly.
The ride to Albany was easy and safe.
With every mile their spirits rose.
At last they were actually on the way home.
At Albany they looked anxiously about the crowded depot for "Mr. Peters."
Nobody appeared at first, and they had time to grow nervous before they saw a gentle, careworn little man coming toward them in company with the conductor.
"I believe you are the young ladies I have come to meet," he said.
"You must excuse my being late, I was detained by business.
There is a great deal to do to move a family out West," he wiped his forehead in a dispirited way. Then he put the girls into a carriage, and gave the driver a direction. "We'd better leave your baggage at the office as we pass," he said, "because we have to get off so early in the morning."
"How early?"
"The boat goes at six, but we ought to be on board by half-past five, so as to be well settled before she starts."
"The boat?" said Katy, opening her eyes.
"Yes. Erie Canal, you know.
Our furniture goes that way, so we judged it best to do the same, and keep an eye on it ourselves.
Never be separated from your property, if you can help it, that's my maxim.
It's the Prairie Belle,—one of the finest boats on the Canal."
"When do we get to Buffalo?" asked Katy, with an uneasy recollection of having heard that canal boats travel slowly.
"Buffalo?
Let me see.
This is Tuesday,—Wednesday, Thursday,—well, if we're lucky we ought to be there Friday evening; so, if we're not too late to catch the night boat on the lake, you'll reach home Saturday afternoon."
Four days!
The girls looked at each other with dismay too deep for words.
Elsie was expecting them by Thursday at latest.
What should they do?
"Telegraph," was the only answer that suggested itself.
So Katy scribbled a despatch,
"Coming by canal.
Don't expect us till Saturday," which she begged Mr. Peters to send; and she and Clover agreed in whispers that it was dreadful, but they must bear it as patiently as they could.
Oh, the patience which is needed on a canal! The motion which is not so much motion as standing still!
The crazy impulse to jump out and help the crawling boat along by pushing it from behind!
How one grows to hate the slow, monotonous glide, the dull banks, and to envy every swift-moving thing in sight, each man on horseback, each bird flying through the air.
Mrs. Peters was a thin, anxious woman, who spent her life anticipating disasters of all sorts.
She had her children with her, three little boys, and a teething baby; and such a load of bundles, and baskets, and brown paper parcels, that Katy and Clover privately wondered how she could possibly have got through the journey without their help.
Willy, the eldest boy, was always begging leave to go ashore and ride the towing horses; Sammy, the second could only be kept quiet by means of crooked pins and fish-lines of blue yarn; while Paul, the youngest, was possessed with a curiosity as to the under side of the boat, which resulted in his dropping his new hat overboard five times in three days, Mr. Peters and the cabin-boy rowing back in a small boat each time to recover it.