Kansas University Weekly.
287
LITERARY.
All at a House Party.
Sleighs full of merry, laughing, young people follow each other up the broad driveway to a beautiful large house in the suburbs of one of our cities. The door is open and there stand the smiling host and hostess waiting to welcome their guests. A fine, spacious hall and broad stairway, handsomely furnished and holly everywhere, about the pictures, on chandelier and mantel with bits of mistletoe here and there announce that it is Christmas and that all sorts of gay times are anticipated.
All troop off merrily to their apartments to prepare for dinner, after which they are to make a business of getting acquainted so that no stifness need interfere with their plans for the next day.
It is Tuesday; Christmas is on Thursday and it is the tradition that a play be given by the guests each New Year's eve, to which all the neighborhood is invited. So they begin making their plans and all during their visit the mornings are spent in rehearsing and preparing costumes; and a very jolly time they have.
When the play was selected, Miss Dorothy Carter was chosen as leading lady and Mr. Walter Holland as leading man. None of these young people had done much in this line but these two seemed best fitted for these roles.
It took two mornings of silence and intense study to learn their parts and then the genuine rehearsing commenced. At first Mr. Holland and Miss Carter were rather disappointing to the others and the casts would have been changed except for fear of offending some one. But they improved and it was decided that the awkwardness had been caused by their never having known each other before and by Dorothy's shyness which made it hard for her to enter fully into the touching scenes in her part.
Christmas day came and a large ball was given; all had a jolly time and Miss Carter was very beautiful, the "belle" of the evening.
On the next day work on the play began
harder than ever and all were amazed to see how much Dorothy and Walter had improved. They seemed inspired, awakened to the possibilities within their grasp and infused a new spirit into the others. Mrs. Wentworth, their hostess, was delighted. The afternoon was spent in skating and all came in rosy and merry to dress for dinner.
The next day when rehearsing commenced everything went wrong; Dorothy and Walter were listless and uninterested, they drawled out their parts and were especially bad in their tête à têtes and everyone was in despair. The passages demanding scorn and contempt regarding one another were acted with a vehemence and reality which was astonishing. But the more peaceful scenes were absolute failures.
The next day things were not improved in the least. On every side they were reproved, now separately, now together and their answers were strange and unsatisfactory.
"Oh Dorothy, why are you so stiff and poky? You were perfect Friday, why can't you be so always?"
"My dear Grace," was the cold and somewhat inconsistent answer, "you never were observing. I assure you I do exactly the same now as I did, exactly. I can only think that perhaps you are no longer in sympathy with this scene as you were then, so you must not blame me."
"Well, Mr. Holland, what is the matter with you? You surely don't claim that you are doing as well as before; what have you to say for yourself?"
"I can only endorse Miss Carter's remarks," responded the young fellow.
"Well then," spoke up Harry Sedgewick, "do you think that Miss Carter did as well today as before?" Dorothy drew back a little, Walter looked straight into her face with a queer smile and said, "No, I don't."
Miss Carter colored slightly and turned away without speaking.