THE GIRL WHO LOOKED LIKE MARY
"It's rather nice to have so much room, but I know I shall never feel
quite at home here," murmured Marjorie Dean, under her breath, as she
came slowly down the steps of her new home and paused for a moment in
the middle of the stone walk which led to the street. Her wistful glance
strayed over the stretch of lawn, still green, then turned to rest on
the house, a comfortable three-story structure of wood, painted dark
green, with lighter green trimmings. Her mother's sudden appearance at
the window caused Marjorie to retrace her steps. Luncheon was ready.
"Everything is so different," she sighed, as she climbed the steps she
had so lately descended. "I've been here a week, and I haven't met a
single girl. I don't believe there are any girls in this neighborhood. I
should feel a good deal worse, too, if the Franklin girls hadn't been
such dears!" Marjorie's last comment, spoken half aloud, referred to the
numerous letters she had received since her arrival in the town of
Sanford from her Franklin High School friends, now so many miles away.
Mary Raymond had not only fulfilled her promise to write one long letter
every week, but had mailed Marjorie, almost daily, hurriedly-written
little notes full of the news of what went on among the boys and girls
she had left behind.
It had been a busy, yet a very long week for Marjorie. The unpacking of
the Deans' furniture, which had been shipped to Sanford a week before
their arrival there, and the setting to rights of her new home had so
occupied the attention of Mrs. Dean and Nora, her faithful
maid-of-all-work, that Marjorie, aside from certain tasks allotted to
her to perform, was left for the most part to her own devices. As they
had arrived in Sanford on Monday, Marjorie's mother had decided to give
her daughter an opportunity to accustom herself to her new home and
surroundings before allowing her to enter the high school. So the day
for Marjorie's initial appearance in "The Sanford High School for Girls"
had been set for the following Monday.
It was now Friday afternoon. Marjorie had spent the morning in writing a
fifteen-page letter to Mary, the minor refrain of which was: "I can't
tell you how much I miss you, Mary," and which contained views regarding
her future high school career that were far from being optimistic. She
had not finished her letter. She decided to leave it open until after
luncheon and, laying it aside for the time, she had tripped down stairs
and out doors.
"What are you going to do this afternoon, dear?" asked her mother as
Marjorie slipped into place at the luncheon table.
"I don't know, Mother," was the almost doleful reply. "I thought I might
take a walk up Orchard street as far as Sargent's, that cunning little
confectioner's shop on the corner. Perhaps, if I go, I may see something
interesting to tell Mary. I haven't finished my letter."
Marjorie did not add that her walk would include a last stroll past the
towering gray walls of a certain stone building on Lincoln avenue, which
bore over its massive oak doors the inscription, "The Sanford High
School for Girls." Almost every day since her arrival, she had visited
it, viewing it speculatively and with a curious kind of apprehension.
She was not afraid to plunge into her new school life, but deep down in
her heart she felt some little misgiving. What if the new girls proved
to be neither likable nor companionable? What if she liked them but they
did not like her? She had just begun the same apprehensive train of
thought that had been disturbing her peace of mind for the last four
days when her mother's voice broke the spell.
"If you are going that far I wish you would go on to Parke & Whitfield's
for me. I should like you to match this embroidery silk. I have not
enough of it to finish this collar and cuff set I am making for you."
"I'll be your faithful servant and execute all your commissions, mum,"
declared Marjorie with a little obeisance, her spirits rising a little
at the prospect of actual errands to perform. She was already tired of
aimlessly wandering along the wide, well-kept streets of Sanford,
feeling herself to be quite out of things. Even errands were actual
blessings sometimes, she decided, as a little later, she ran upstairs to
dress.
"May I wear my best suit and hat, Mother?" she called anxiously down
from the head of the stairs. "It's such a lovely day, I'm sure it won't
rain, snow, hail or do anything else to spoil them."
"Very well," answered Mrs. Dean, placidly.
With a gurgle of delight Marjorie hurried into her room to put on her
new brown suit, which had the mark of a well-known tailor in the coat,
and her best hat, on which all the Franklin High girls had set their
seal of approval. She had shoes and gloves to match her suit, too, and
her dancing brown eyes and fluffy brown hair were the last touches
needed to complete the dainty little study in brown.
"Don't I look nice in this suit?" she asked her mother saucily, turning
slowly around before the living-room mirror. "Aren't you and father
perfect dears to let me have it, though?" She whirled and descended upon
her mother with outstretched arms, enveloping her in an ecstatic hug
that sadly disturbed the proper angle of her brown velvet hat.
"Don't be gone too long," reminded her mother. "You know father has
promised us tickets for the theatre to-night. We shall have an early
dinner."
"All right, I'll remember, Captain." With a brisk touching of her hand
to her hat brim in salute Marjorie vanished through the door, to
reappear a moment later at the living-room window, flash a merry smile
at her mother, about face and march down the walk in true military
style.
Long before when Marjorie was a tiny girl she had shown an unusual
preference for soldiers. She had owned enough wooden soldiers to make a
regiment and was never at a loss to invent war games in which they
figured. Sometimes, when she tired of her stiff, silent armies, which
could only move as she willed, she inveigled her father or mother into
being the hero, the enemy, the traitor or whatever her active
imagination chose to suggest. Her parents, amused at her boyish love of
military things, encouraged her in her play and entered into it with as
much spirit as the child herself. Her father, who had once been an
officer in the National Guard, taught her the manual of arms and she had
learned it with a will.
Marjorie's military enthusiasm had been at its height when she met Mary
Raymond, who soon became equally fascinated with the stirring play. In
time other interests crowded their lives. The hard-worked armies were
laid peacefully on their wooden backs to enjoy a long, undisturbed rest,
while Marjorie and Mary became soldiers instead, addressing Mr. Dean as
"General," Mrs. Dean as "Captain," and bestowing upon themselves the
rank of ordinary enlisted soldiers who must earn their promotion by
loyal and faithful service.
Mr. Dean had been rather chary of promotions, frequently reminding his
little detachment that it is a far cry from the ranks of a private to
that of a commissioned officer. So when their parting came, Mary and
Marjorie had just received their commissions as second lieutenants,
their awards of faithful service in the grammar school.
Lieutenant Marjorie smiled, then sighed, as she started on her walk. The
salute she had just given brought a flood of memories of Mary. She felt
she would not mind exploring this strange, new, high school territory if
Mary were with her. She was sure no girl in Sanford could understand her
as Mary had. On two different afternoons she had stood across the street
from the school at the time of dismissal. She had eagerly watched the
great oak doors open wide and the long lines of girls file out, waking
the still October air with their merry voices. She had been particularly
attracted toward one tall, lithe, graceful girl whose golden hair and
brown eyes made her unusually lovely. At first sight of her, lonely,
imaginative Marjorie had named her "The Picture Girl," and had decided
that she was a darling. She had noticed that the pretty girl was always
the center of a group and she had also noted that one small,
black-haired girl with an elfish face, who wore the most exquisite
clothes invariably walked at the tall girl's side. There was a
pink-cheeked girl, too, with laughing blue eyes and dimples, and a
fair-haired, serious-faced girl, who reminded Marjorie of Alice Duval.
They usually formed part of the group about the tall girl and her dark
companion, and there was also a very short, stout girl who puffed along
anxiously in the rear of the group as though never quite able to catch
up.
Marjorie had already imagined much concerning this particular knot of
girls, and her desire to see them again before entering school was
responsible for her walk down Lincoln avenue that sunny fall afternoon.
She would do her errands first, she decided, then, returning by the way
of the school, pass there just at the time that the afternoon session
was dismissed. She went about her far-from-arduous commissions in
leisurely fashion, now and then glancing at her châtelaine watch to make
sure of the time. Three o'clock saw the daily procession of girls down
the high school steps, and released from classes for the day. She did
not intend to miss them.
It was twenty minutes to three when Marjorie finished a remarkable
concoction of nuts, chocolate syrup and ice cream, a kind of glorified
nut sundae, rejoicing in the name of "Sargent Nectar," and left the
smart little confectioner's shop. As she neared the school building her
eyes suddenly became riveted upon a slim, blue-clad figure that
hesitated for on instant at the top of the high steps then ran lightly
down and came hurrying toward where she stood.
"The advance guard," declared Marjorie half aloud. Then, as her eyes
sought the approaching girl: "Why, she looks like Mary! And she's been
crying! I'm going to speak to her." She took an impulsive step forward
as the stranger came abreast of her and began:
"Won't you----"
Marjorie's speech ended abruptly. The weeping girl cast one startled
glance toward her from a pair of wet blue eyes, lunged by her without
speaking and, breaking into a run, turned the corner and disappeared
from view. Marjorie surveyed the back of the rapidly vanishing yellow
head with rueful surprise. Then she gave a short laugh.
"I should have known better," she reflected. "Of course, she'd hardly
care to tell her personal affairs to the first one who asks her. But she
made me think of Mary. Oh, dear, I'm so homesick. Not even my new suit
and hat can make me forget that. I wouldn't have mother know it for the
world. I believe she is a wee bit homesick, too."
Marjorie paused for an instant at her accustomed place on the opposite
side of the street, undecided whether to loiter there and once more
watch her future companions pass out of school or to go on about her
business. Suddenly the school doors swung wide and the pupils began
flocking out. The little stranger yielded to the temptation to linger
long enough to watch the five girls pass in whom she had become
interested. They were among the last to emerge and, the moment they
reached the steps, their voices rose in a confused babble, each one
determined to make herself heard above the others.
"I knew she wouldn't do it," shrilled the stout girl, as they neared
Marjorie. "She's too stingy for words. That's the third time she's
refused to go into things with the rest of us."
"Be still," reminded the Picture Girl; "she might have very good
reasons----"
"Good reasons," scornfully mimicked the little dark girl, her black eyes
glittering angrily. "It was only because the plan was mine. She hates
me, and you all know why. I don't think you ought to stand up for her,
Muriel. You know how deceitful she is and what unkind things she said
about me."
"I'm not standing up for her," contradicted Muriel, but her tones
lacked force. "I only felt a little bit sorry for her. She looked ready
to cry all the afternoon. I think she went home early to avoid meeting
us."
"That proves she is a coward," was the triumphant retort. "Remember----"
With a sudden swift movement she rose on tiptoe and, drawing the Picture
Girl's head to the level of her mouth, whispered something to her. The
fair-haired girl looked annoyed, the fat girl openly sulky and the
dimpled girl disapproving. Exchanging significant glances, they walked
on ahead of the other two.
Without the slightest intention of being an eavesdropper, Marjorie had
heard every word of the loud-spoken conversation. Her eyes were fixed in
fascination upon the dark, sharp-featured face so close to the fair,
beautiful one. She suddenly recalled a picture she had once seen called
"The Evil Genius," in which a dark, mocking face peered over the
shoulder of a young man who sat at a table as though in deep thought.
This girl's vivid face bore a slight resemblance to that of the Evil
Genius, and it was not until the end of Marjorie's junior year in
Sanford that this sinister impression faded and disappeared forever.
When the little company had passed on down the street, Marjorie turned
and followed them from a distance. For several blocks her way lay in the
same direction, but as she turned into her own street she swept a last
glance toward the five girls. She wondered whom they had been discussing
so freely. She was vaguely disappointed in the Picture Girl, who seemed
to her independent mind too easily influenced by the Evil Genius.
Marjorie had already begun to think of the small, dark girl as that. She
was glad not to be the girl they had discussed. Then, her thought
changing, a vision of two wet blue eyes and a tear-stained face set in
fluffy yellow curls came to her, and Marjorie knew that she had seen the
object of their discussion. A wave of sympathy for the offender swept
over her. "I don't believe she could do anything deceitful or horrid,"
she reflected stoutly. "Her eyes are as true and as blue as Mary's. I'm
going to like her and be her friend, if she'll let me, for she certainly
seems to need one. I did so want to be friends with the Picture Girl,
but I can't help wishing she had been just a little bit braver."
While Marjorie strolled thoughtfully home, deep in her own cogitations,
the five girls, having joined forces again, were discussing her.
"Did you see that pretty girl standing across from the school as we came
out?" asked Susan Atwell, the girl with the dimples.
"Yes," returned Irma Linton. "I noticed her there the other day, too. I
wonder who she can be."
"I don't know," said Muriel Harding. "She is awfully sweet though, and
dresses beautifully. She----"
"I know all about her," interrupted Geraldine Macy. "Her father is the
new manager for Preston & Haines. They only moved here from the city
last week. Her name is Dean. That is, her last name. I don't know her
other name."
"I am surprised that you don't know that," was the sarcastic comment of
Mignon La Salle, the little dark girl.
"You needn't be," flung back the stout girl. "There are lots of things I
don't know that I'd like to know. For instance----"
"Don't be cross, Jerry," interrupted Mignon, hastily. "I was only
teasing you." She cast a peculiar glance at the ruffled Jerry from under
her heavy lashes which the young woman failed to catch. "Tell us some
more about this new girl. I really didn't pay hardly any attention to
her to-day."
"There isn't anything more to tell that I know of," muttered Jerry,
sulkily, her desire to distribute news quite gone. "Wait until Monday
and see. I know she's going to enter Sanford High and that she's a
freshman."
"Then as freshmen it's our solemn duty to be nice to her and make her
feel at home," stated Muriel, seriously.
Mignon La Salle shrugged her thin shoulders. "Perhaps," she said,
without enthusiasm. "I shall wait until I see her before I decide that."
Meanwhile, Marjorie had reached home, and, seated before the library
table, was writing for dear life on the letter she had begun to Mary. So
far she had had nothing to tell her chum regarding the young women who
were to be her classmates. To be sure, what she had seen and heard that
afternoon had amounted to nothing, but the girl who looked like Mary had
set her to longing all over again to be able, just for one afternoon, to
sit side by side on the front steps with her childhood's friend and talk
things over.
"You can't imagine, Mary," she wrote, "how sorry I felt when I saw that
poor girl crying with your eyes. They were just like yours. I forgot
everything except that she looked like you, and asked her what the
trouble was. Of course, she didn't answer me, but actually ran down the
street. I should have known better, but I felt so terribly sympathetic.
'Terribly' is the only word that expresses it. Right after she had gone
the others began to come out of school, and at last the five girls I
told you about came out. They were all talking at once, but I heard the
horrid, sharp-faced, dark girl say that someone was stingy and deceitful
and a lot of other unpleasant things. I thought the Picture Girl was
going to stand up for the person, but that mean little Evil Genius
wouldn't let her. Then all at once it came to me that it was this Mary
girl they were talking about. It was really this one dark girl who said
most of the mean things. The others just listened to her. At any rate,
I'm going to find out who the Mary girl is and try to be a friend to her
just because she looks like you. Don't imagine I could ever like her
better than you, because you know I couldn't. But it's a true soldier's
duty to stand by his comrades on the firing line, you know, and I am
going to be this girl's freshman comrade, and, if she's one-half as nice
as you, I'll be ready to help her fight her battles.
"Monday is the great day. I dread it, and yet I am looking forward to
it. I like the outside of the school, but will I like the inside? Mother
is going to the principal's office with me. I hope I sha'n't have to try
a lot of tiresome examinations. I have forgotten everything I ever knew,
and the weather has been too pleasant to study. This is such a pretty
town, with plenty of nice walks. If only you were here it would be quite
perfect. I do hope you can come and visit me at Easter. Must stop now,
as I hear mother calling me. We are going to walk down to meet father.
With my dearest love. Write soon.
"Yours always,
"Marjorie."
Marjorie folded, addressed and stamped her letter, then catching her
hat from the hallrack ran out the front door to overtake her mother who
had walked on ahead.
"I finished my letter to Mary," she held it up for inspection, "and I've
something to report, Captain."
"I am ready to hear you," smiled her mother, as they walked on arm in
arm.
For the second time Marjorie related her little adventure, ending with
her resolve to learn to know and befriend, if necessary, the girl who
looked like Mary. Nor did she have the slightest premonition of how much
this readily-avowed championing of a stranger was to cost her.