Chapter 6 ESTHER'S ROOM

Just above the small alcohol lamp the teakettle was beginning to sing. On a table near-by were teacups and saucers, with one plate of sandwiches covered over with a small napkin, and another of cookies.

Several times a tall girl glanced at the clock and then walked across the room to take the kettle off the stove, only to place it back again the next instant.

Then at last she seated herself by an open piano. There was very little furniture in the room except the piano, a small cot and the table. Yet it had an atmosphere of home and comfort, such as some persons are able to give to a tent in a desert. And standing in a row at the back of the same tea table were three candles in ten-cent-store glass candlesticks, waiting to be lighted. The afternoon was a dismal one, with occasional flurries of snow; so that when the proper time came for the candle-lighting, the flames would not be ungrateful.

But in order to make the waiting seem less long the girl was evidently trying to distract her attention by practicing her music. Several times she sang over the scales. And then, dissatisfied with her own work, repeated them until finally her voice rose with unusual resonance and power. Then, after another slight pause, she drifted almost unconsciously into the words of a song:

"Burn, fire, burn!

Flicker, flicker, flame!

Whose hand above this blaze is lifted

Shall be with magic touch engifted,

To warm the hearts of lonely mortals

Who stand without their open portals.

The torch shall draw them to the fire

Higher, higher

By desire.

Whoso shall stand by this hearthstone,

Flame-fanned,

Shall never, never stand alone;

Whose house is dark and bare and cold,

Whose house is cold,

This is his own.

Flicker, flicker, flicker, flame;

Burn, fire burn!"

She had not heard the door open softly nor even noticed the figure that crept softly into the small room.

But now a pair of gloved hands were clasped eagerly together and an enthusiastic voice said:

"Esther Crippen, that is the loveliest song in all the world and you are the loveliest singer of it! How glad I am to have arrived at just this moment! Why, your little room makes me feel that it is a real refuge from all that is dark and bare and cold. And you surely are with the 'magic touch engifted to warm the hearts of lonely mortals' with that beautiful voice of yours."

And Polly O'Neill, putting one hand on each of Esther's cheeks, kissed her with unexpected ardor.

It made Esther flush and tremble slightly as she rose to greet her long-desired guest. Any compliment made Esther shy and one from Polly more than from another person. For although each girl admired the other's talents and character, they had never understood each other especially well. Esther always seemed to Polly far too sober and almost too unselfish and self-effacing, while Polly to the quieter girl had all the brilliance and unreliability of a will-o'-the-wisp. Before coming to New York for the winter their intimacy had been due largely to their mutual devotion to Betty; but now, both lonely and both in a new environment, they had been greatly drawn together. Polly's occasional visits had been one of Esther's few sources of pleasure outside her work.

"How charming you are looking, Polly," Esther began, taking off her guest's dark coat and hat, and seeing her emerge in a crimson woolen dress, which made a bright spot of color in the shabby room. Polly, you must remember, was only pretty on occasions; but this afternoon was certainly one of her good-looking days. The cold had made her pale cheeks flame and given a softer glow to her eyes.

"I am simply ravenous, Esther, and dying for your delicious tea," Polly next remarked, following her hostess to the tea table and taking her seat, while Esther poured out the boiling water. "It is a kind of a homesick day and I have been wishing that we were going to have a meeting of our old Sunrise Hill Camp Fire circle. What wouldn't you give for a glimpse of the Princess this afternoon?"

Esther's lips twitched as she lighted her three candles.

"Almost anything I possess," she returned.

"But you are going to see her pretty soon? You are going back to Woodford for Christmas?" Polly tried to hide her own nervousness in putting this simple question. With her eyes shining over the edge of her cup she continued slowly drinking her tea, so that the rest of her face could not be seen.

But Esther was not paying her any special attention. Quietly she shook her head. "No, Polly, I am not going home. I am so sorry, for I wanted to dreadfully. But my music lessons are so expensive that father does not feel he can afford to let me come. I haven't yet had the courage to write and break the news to the Princess. She is fond of me, don't you think so, Polly? She will be sorry that I can't be with her for the holidays? Of course I know she does not care for me as she does for you. I shall never expect that. But it does mean so much to me to feel sure of her affection."

Polly frowned in a slightly puzzled fashion. Esther's adoration even of her beloved Betty seemed a little unnatural. Why should one girl care so much about the attitude of another one? She loved Betty herself, of course, and Betty loved her. Yet she doubted very much if either one worried over the emotions of the other.

"Oh, yes, Esther," Polly returned a trifle impatiently. "Of course Betty is devoted to you. Why shouldn't she be? Really, I do think you would let her almost trample upon you if she liked. Only Betty never would like to hurt any one, thank heaven! But I am glad to hear you are not going home for the Christmas holidays, because I am not going either."

There was nothing so remarkable in this statement that it should make Polly turn white and then red again. But fortunately the three Camp Fire candles, "Work, Health and Love," were now flickering so that the elder girl could not get a clear vision of the other's face.

But instead of appearing pleased over this news Esther seemed disappointed. "I am so sorry, for Betty's sake," she returned. "She wouldn't mind my not being with her so much if she only might have you."

Polly shrugged her thin shoulders in a fashion she had when vexed.

"O Esther, I think you might have been polite enough to say that you would be glad to have me in town if you were to be here-particularly when I came to ask you if I might spend the holidays with you."

"Spend the holidays with me?" Esther repeated in rather a stupid fashion. Naturally she was puzzled as to just why a girl in Polly's position should elect to spend her Christmas vacation in a cheap New York boarding house with another girl for whom she had no special sentiment.

"Why in the world do you want to remain in the city with me?" she asked again, too honest to pretend that pleasure was her first sentiment until she got a more definite understanding of the situation.

But Polly was now making no effort to devote her attention either to eating or drinking. Instead she had rested both elbows on the table and was looking at her companion with the half-pleading, half-commanding expression that both Mollie and Betty knew so well.

"Promise not to say anything until I have finished?" she began coaxingly. "For you see it is to explain why I want to stay with you that made me write to ask you to make this engagement with me for this afternoon."