Mrs. Knowles and Charlotte appeared at half past ten and found him in the living-room, writing.
“Why, John! What was the matter with you? You’ve frightened us to death!”
“You oughtn’t to have left home ahead of me,” said John. “I was there on time, but that Beasley girl discovered I’d put on this coat with my black pants and white vest and insisted that I come home and change.”
“But you could have hurried home and changed and still have been only a little late.”
“I did hurry home and Nora hunted up the right coat for me, but she didn’t stay to see me put it on and I happened to get into this one again. I found it out just the other side of Wilson Park. And of course there was nothing to do then but come here and wait for you.”
“He’s crazy, Mother!” said Charlotte.
“I honestly believe he is! John, John, what am I going to do?”
“Well, you might tell me what went on.”
“Oh, there were prayers and singing and the baccalaureate address by Doctor Stetson. He was perfectly wonderful!”
“What did he say?”
“He told why this was called ‘Commencement’; that while you young men and women were ending your high-school careers, you were really just commencing life. And that’s why it’s called ‘Commencement.’ He was wonderful!”
“And they presented the diplomas,” said Charlotte. “I suppose Beth Beasley got yours.”
“Why?”
“Because she’s wild about you and that will give her an excuse to see you again soon.”
“Does she need an excuse?”
“Girls don’t like—”
“Listen,” interrupted John. “Does this sound any good?”
He read from the scrap paper on which he had been writing:
But let no man who does not court quick death
So much as whisper, breathe the softest breath
Of scandal in the presence of De Setto
Against this sloe-eyed princess of the Ghetto,
Whose infidelity has been notorious,
But who, to him, is pure, angelic, glorious.
Not those who’ve given him for years their loyalty
Dare hint that she is something less than royalty.
“It sounds pretty,” said Mrs. Knowles. “What is it?”
“It’s a thing I’ve been working on for over eight months. It’s part of a libretto.”
“A libretto for what?”
“For an American grand opera.”
“Who’s going to write the music?”
“How can I tell? How can I know whether any of our great composers will like it? But when it is finished, which I will be in three or four months more, I intend to take it to New York and try to get somebody interested.”
“In three months you’ll be going to college.”
“Mother, I don’t want to go to college.”
“But I want you to, John. You must do this one thing for me. Your high-school diploma saves you the bother of an entrance examination and I understand that the university practically allows you your choice of subjects. You can take the literary course, which certainly won’t hurt your writing talent, and you can find time to work slowly and carefully on this opera thing until you have it perfect. You’ve got to do this, John. Your father wanted you to. He didn’t go himself and was always sorry. Please say you will.”
So John said he would and in mid-September he started for the station to catch the train for his state university, Michigan. His mother was not feeling well and neither she nor Charlotte, who had a tennis date with her boyfriend, Wallie Blair, came down to see him off. This proved unfortunate. There were two trains in the station and John, without questioning anyone, boarded the one westbound.
The conductor, taking his ticket, informed him that he was going in the wrong direction for Ann Arbor and advised him to get off at Niles and catch the next train east. John took the advice, but left his handbag and suitcase on the Chicago train. As he had also lost his trunk check, it was some days before he really got settled.
We will be brief about his one year in college. It was terribly hard to escape a complete flunk. It was harder to live alone. He never remembered to send out laundry until there was nothing left to wear. He was never able to concentrate on what went on in the classroom and never listened to a lecture. One day he wore one black shoe and one tan shoe, and four or five of his classmates followed him across the campus, reciting:
Diddle-diddle dumpling, my son Jack;
One shoe brown and one shoe black.
He was always late in paying for his board and lodging because his mind was on something else.
He went home at Christmas and for spring vacation, but forgot to take along certain garments in need of a woman’s tender care.
June came at last and John miraculously managed to get away from Ann Arbor with the loss of one spring overcoat, four shirts, a pair of shoes, half a dozen ties and the mates of a dozen socks. He had packed in a hurry because he knew that a co-ed living next door would be over to bid goodbye if he didn’t leave way ahead of time. She was not the only co-ed who had tried to become friendly. In spite of the occasional eccentricity of his attire, the girls were strong for him.
One day in July, John read in a Chicago paper that a famous American composer, whom we will call Deems Taylor, had sailed for Europe, where he intended to hide until he had written a libretto of his own.
John excitedly summoned his mother, asked her whether she could afford to send he abroad, told her why he wanted to go, gained her consent and bought his ticket for New York. This time Mrs. Knowles and Charlotte put him on the right train.
The paper had not given a hint of the composer’s hideaway excepting that it would be somewhere in Europe, but to John, Europe and Paris were synonymous and
