The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1942-11-20
CHAPTER II

BECAUSE, Tie gil OhCA GU oAo"AJ
and doubtfully, ''it wasn't that way.
I was only seven, but I knew that
something was wrong. Nothing was
left for me, no pictures OF anyone,
no letters or names. This school,
you know, isn't like an ordinary
school. We know we aren't like 9TH
er girls. Everyone here has some
strange history-no letters, no going
home for holidays, no presents and
surprises"
''No; this isn't a regular school"
he conceded. "But according to
Emma it was the best thing to do.
And you seem to have flourished,
he added with smile. "You've
gone along here more as If it were
home :"
s'With a capital letter!" she put
in as he paused.
He looked at her in his kindly
way and smiled.
"a place where girls are protect
ed and safe, and well fed :" He
raised questioning eyes. "Wen
fed?" he asked.
"Not so-oh, yes, all right" she
conceded, not interested. An impa-
tient jerk of her head took him back
to the point where he had inter-
rupted himself.
.And are taught good profess
sions," he finished.
''Dressmaking, bookkeeping, Ste
biography, beauty-parlor work." she
supplied. "But," she added, chose
aren't what they teach girls in other
schools. But that won't keep me
from trying terribly hard to make
good. You said something about a
position? What am 4 to dog"
''You are not to do anything until
you find Just what you want to do"
he said, his grazing hair and his
fifty years making it possible for
him to use a fathers kindly tone.
''But for the time being ii is sec
retarial position with the same old
lady-a very rich old woman named
Mrs. Porter-Mrs. Porteous Porter,
for whom Emma works. Answering
the telephone, and correspondence,
and reading that sort of thing"
"Oh, THAR" the girl said with a
frightening face. "That think /
could dol"
s'I'm sure you could, And you
would be paid seventy-five dollars a
month"
'sSeventy-five dollars a month! Oh,
she is kind!"
sWhen-when would go?" she
asked.
'This is-let's see, the third" ne
said. Suppose you come down on
Monday? Mondays. q good day to
start. You take train at half past
FIVE in the afternoon and at seven
the. next night someone will meet
you at the Oakland Mole"
Sunday wouldn't do?'''' she asked.
sWhy not?" "a "a sas
IL 81 was thinking, when you said
Oakland, that two Sisters are going
down, to the Oakland house on Sum
day; we're having "a jubilee for
,.fhem Sunday, afternoon; they would
take me-" - sa
v of.tfThat would he ian excellent ar
rangement. You come first to my
house, you understand, and we can
60 over and see Emma when you've
= some clothes and have had time to
look about little. must see Moth
.ser Superior before i 60 and make
I the arrangements for you.
And then they were walking back
. toward the convent 8 main building,
through wide. orderly, dinly lighted
corridors.
y 's.I must tell you about my fam
lily, Cherry" the man said. s'My
mother lives with us-Mrs. Clay
Judson Marshbanks; she sounds
little formidable and she is a little
formidable! Then there's my pretty
wife--I lost my first wife," he in
iterrupted himself to explain, land
Fran is almost young enough to be
my daughter. I've e son Greg-he's
twenty-four, of at college in the
East, and also with us is my broth
er's daughter, Amy. Any's mother
died when she was little girl; her
father was killed in an accident q
few years after that, and my moth
err has had her since making her
bow in society now and quite grown
up. 20
She was going away from the only
world she knew; the air was full
of farewells and heartaches, and
strange excited happiness of antici-
patton.
It had once been a sufficiently
stark and comfortless regime. But
times were changed now. Mother
Superior was noted for the moderni-
ty of her views. Her girls, she said,
must presently face the world as it
was-with al its hurry of planes