JERRY SPEAKS HER MIND
“The ten-thirty rule will have to chase itself merrily around the
campus,” Jerry made airy disposition of that time-honored regulation as
she entered the room which Marjorie was already beginning to set to
rights. With her usual energy the stout girl gathered up the glasses,
tucking them one inside another and setting them in a compact row at one
end of the study table.
“I agree with you, Jeremiah. I have letters to read that must be read,
ten-thirty rule or no.” Marjorie whisked an armful of crumpled paper
napkins and empty paper plates into the waste basket. “There;” she
cleared the table of crumbs; “that’ll do for tonight. Thank goodness,
all the eats were eaten.”
“I can count on my fingers the times we’ve defied old ten-thirty,” Jerry
declared as she reached in the table drawer for her two letters.
“Ten times in four years,” Marjorie commented. “That’s a good record.”
“True, Bean, true. When we stop to consider the past—how wonderful we
are!” Jerry simpered self-appreciatively at Marjorie as she sat down
under the drop light with her letters.
“How can I help but believe it when you say it like that?” rallied
Marjorie. “Anyway, you’re a gem, Jeremiah. I was never more agreeably
surprised than when you turned the tables on Miss Peyton tonight. I
hadn’t noticed that their door stood open. But you had, smart child. I
had no idea you’d been out in the hall on a tour of discovery.”
“I went directly after you were out there. I had a hunch that the Ice
Queen would start something. So she did—through those two geese. They
had that room last year and didn’t appear to mind our occasional
soirees. But there’s still another and a chief disturber—Leslie Cairns.
She’s back of the Ice Queen.”
“I think so, too,” Marjorie admitted with reluctance. “I have seen them
together several times. Leslie Cairns has other friends on the campus,
too. Muriel and I saw her and Miss Monroe coming out of Craig Hall this
afternoon.”
“You did?” Jerry showed surprise. “I’ll investigate that. I may find out
something interesting. Miss Morris, that nice senior you’ve heard me
speak of, who came to the campus last fall from Vassar, says there are
only seniors and juniors at Craig Hall this year. Perhaps it was the Ice
Queen’s friends she and Leslie Cairns were calling upon.”
“That may be,” Marjorie agreed. “I wonder if Miss Monroe likes Leslie
Cairns? Perhaps she cares more about cars and expensive clothes and
spending money than anything else. We don’t know her, so we can’t even
guess what sort of girl she is at heart.”
“I know what will happen to her if she puts any dependence in Leslie
Cairns,” Jerry said grimly. “Don’t waste your sympathy on her, Marjorie.
She isn’t worthy of it.”
“I don’t know why I feel so sorry about her, but I do,” Marjorie
confessed. “Whenever I see that beautiful face of hers I forget she’s
been so ungracious to us. She’s not a namby-pamby kind of pretty girl.
She has a high, royal kind of beauty. I’ve not given her up yet,
Jeremiah. I’m going to try popularity for her against Leslie Cairns’
money. I’m going to put her in the first show we have. I’ll have Robin
ask her. I’ll stay in the background for awhile.”
“Nil desperandum,” Jerry encouraged with an indulgent grin. “Mignon La
Salle reformed just to please Marvelous Manager. Why not others? Besides
there’s always the pleasant possibility that the Hob-goblin and the Ice
Queen may squabble and part.”
“So Muriel says. I mean about those two girls disagreeing. You may make
fun of me all you please, Jerry. Just the same if we could win Miss
Monroe over to our side it would gradually put everything straight here
at the Hall. If Miss Monroe became our friend, she would probably become
friends with the Bertram five. She’s friends already with the other
sophs and freshies here. Things which are equal to the same thing are
equal to each other, you know. Leslie Cairns’ friendship cannot be
beneficial to her. I am sure of that. Yet to warn her against Miss
Cairns would be contemptible. Excuse me, Jeremiah, for keeping you from
your letters!” Marjorie exclaimed in sudden contrition. “It’ll be
midnight before I’ve read all these.” She flourished the handful of
letters before Jerry’s eyes.
“Go to it, or it may be morning. Why waste precious time flaunting your
letters in my face? Why should your five to my two make you
vainglorious?”
“Who’s vainglorious?” Marjorie made a half threatening move up from her
chair. She dropped back again, laughing, as Jerry nimbly put the length
of the table between them.
“Lots of people are vainglorious.” Jerry wisely grew vague. “Don’t
bother me, Bean. I hope to read my letters in peace and quiet. Yes?”
“_So do I_,” emphasized Marjorie.
The chums exchanged good-humored smiles, born of perfect understanding
and settled down to the patiently deferred reading of their letters.
Jerry read Helen’s letter first. She knew it would be long and
absorbing. Hal’s would be his usual brief note. It was his weekly
offering. Long since Jerry had made him promise to write once a week and
had pledged herself to do the same by him. A strong devotion lived
between brother and sister which had deepened year by year. Hal did not
pretend to understand Jerry from the standpoint of girlhood. To him she
was a good comrade; “the squarest kid going.” Jerry was of the private
belief that she knew Hal better than he knew himself.
Her one sorrowful concern in life was the knowledge that Marjorie
“couldn’t see old Hal for a minute.” She would have tried to further
Hal’s unflourishing cause with Marjorie, but there seemed to be no way
of accomplishment. She knew only too well Marjorie’s utter lack of
sentimental interest in Hal; her rooted aloofness to “love” as Hal had
hoped she might experience it. “A regular stony heart,” Jerry had
secretly characterized her.
Jerry had shrewdly divined for herself the true state of affairs between
the two. Neither had ever spoken intimately to her of the other.
Nevertheless when Marjorie had left Severn Beach for her midsummer
journey to Hamilton during the summer previous, Jerry had been convinced
that she had “turned Hal down.” She had wondered then, and since, how
Marjorie could fail to love her big, handsome brother—not because he had
been devoted to her since their first meeting—but for himself.
The expression of good-natured amusement which had visited her face
during the reading of Helen’s letter remained until she had read Hal’s
note several times. Then concern replaced it, making her round face very
solemn. She shot a covert glance at Marjorie who was deep in Mary
Raymond’s letter. She had already devoured the contents of her General’s
and Captain’s letters. Both had been comparatively short and loving
inquiries as to whether they might hope for her “gracious presence at
Castle Dean over Thanksgiving.” Neither superior officer had made a
point of asking her to come home. Unselfishly, as ever, they deferred to
her judgment.
Marjorie had gulped down her rising emotions as she had read and
realized afresh her father’s and mother’s breadth of spirit. She had
taken up Mary’s letter, feeling that she must go home at all events for
the holiday. Mary had the long and astonishing confidence to impart that
she had fallen in love, was engaged to be married the following
September and that her engagement was soon to be announced at a formal
luncheon to be given for her by her mother.
“Oh, Jerry!” Marjorie looked up brightly from her letter. “Mary’s going
to be married. I’ll tell you all she writes about the great event while
we are getting ready for bed. I haven’t time now.” Her hands were busy
opening the letter from Constance as she spoke. Again she dropped into
silence and the perusal of Connie’s letter. “Isn’t it too bad?” she soon
cried out. “Connie and Laurie are not going to be in Sanford for
Thanksgiving. Laurie promised a composer friend of his to be present at
the first performance of his new opera ‘The Azure Butterfly.’ He and
Connie are going to New York.”
“That settles it for me. There’ll be one distinguished mug missing on
the campus. I’m going home for Turkey Day.” Marjorie’s news concerning
Constance and Laurie had crystalized Jerry’s wavering resolve to go to
Sanford. “Poor old Hal! A fine time he’d have with all of us away!”
A swift flood of crimson deepened the glow in Marjorie’s cheeks; rose
even to her white forehead. She stared self-consciously at Jerry for an
instant. Without a word she laid down Connie’s letter and took up the
envelope addressed to her in Charlie Stevens’ straggling hand.
First exploration of its contents and she broke into a low amused laugh:
“Do listen to this, Jerry,” she begged.
Jerry raised her eyes from Hal’s letter, at which she had been soberly
staring. She was provoked with herself for having mentioned Hal to
Marjorie as an object for sympathy.
Occupied with the letter from Charlie, Marjorie did not notice Jerry’s
gloomy features. Mirthfully she read:
“DEAR MARJORIE:
“I think your last letter to me was a dandy. I read it twice and
I was going to read it again only I lost it. Maybe I lost it on
the football ground or in the street. But if anyone finds it
they’ll see your name on the end of it and guess that I am the
right Charlie it belongs to. Then I might get it again. I know
you won’t be mad cause I lost it. I couldn’t help it.
“Connie is going to New York with Laurie for Thanksgiving. She
has to go because he is her husband. We are very sorry. I don’t
mean we are sorry because Laurie is her husband but because they
are going away. The band is coming to our house for a party on
Thanksgiving evening. I am going to play an awful hard piece on
my fiddle that Father Stevens composed just for me. You’d better
come home and then you can come to see us that night. I like
you, Marjorie, quite a bit better than Mary Raymond. Connie says
Mary is going to be married. I used to say when I was real
little that I was going to marry her. I don’t say it now. I
didn’t know any better then.
“I hope there will be snow and ice on Thanksgiving. Will you go
skating on the pond with me if there is? I can skate fine and
make a figure eight and a double loop on the ice. Hal Macy took
me to the Sanford ice rink last Saturday afternoon. He showed me
how to make the figure eight. He is a dandy fellow, only he
doesn’t talk much. You ought to see him play basket ball. He has
all the Sanford fellows beat. I like him because he always goes
around with the fellows and not the girls. He thinks you are
quite nice. I let him read your letter before I lost it and he
said I was a lucky kid. I could write some more but I can’t
think just what to write. I will write some more some other
time. You had better come home soon. You and me and Hal Macy
will go skating. It is all right for you to go with him. He
would just as soon go any place with you because he has been to
your house lots of times to parties and you have been to his
house and that’s the way it is. I have to go and practice an
hour on my fiddle so good-bye Marjorie and I send you my love.
Hurry up home.
“From your best friend,
“CHARLIE STEVENS.”
“Good for that kid!” The cry of approbation came straight from Jerry’s
heart. “Old Hal has had a lonesome time in Sanford for the past two
years. He could have gone into business for himself in New York after he
was graduated from college, but he knew Father needed him in his
business.” Jerry checked herself with the reminder that Hal would not
wish her to glorify him, especially to Marjorie.
“Hal is splendid.” Marjorie was always first to give Hal his due,
impersonally. “I know it has been lonesome for him in Sanford without
the old crowd and—and—he must miss you so, Jerry,” she finished rather
lamely. She meant it in all earnestness. She understood perfectly the
bond between Hal and Jerry.
“Not half so much as I’m sure he misses you.” Jerry grew bold for once.
“This is what he has written me. You can see for yourself what a good
sport he is.” She did not look at Marjorie as she read:
“DEAR JERRY:
“Yours of last week appreciated. You haven’t yet said what you
are going to do about Thanksgiving. That I suppose will depend
on the way matters stand at Hamilton. If you don’t come home I
will keep Father and Mother busy looking after me so they won’t
miss you too much. Connie and Laurie will be in New York over
Thanksgiving so I must cheer up Charlie by taking him to the
football game between the Riverside Giants and the Sanford High
team. I have been coaching the Sanford fellows a little. It’s
going to be some game. Hope you’ll be on hand to see it.
“Just remind Marjorie that I wrote her last. Tell her she can
square herself with me by coming home for Thanksgiving. Connie
told me yesterday she had written to Marjorie. Hard lines to
have Connie and Laurie away on the grand old day. Better try and
see what you can do for me. With love. Good night old kid.
“HAL.”
“Why, I don’t owe Hal a letter!” Marjorie regarded Jerry in surprise.
“He owes me one.”
“He _does_?” Jerry showed more surprise than had Marjorie. “Well, I
believe both of you. It’s a plain case of ‘all have won.’ Meanwhile
where is that latest glowing proof of a flourishing correspondence?”
“Lost in the mail, perhaps,” Marjorie guessed. She became silent for a
moment. “I’m doubly sorry about it. I shouldn’t care to have Hal think—”
Marjorie paused; looked away from Jerry’s keen blue eyes, so like Hal’s,
in confused embarrassment.
“You know what to do.” Jerry kindly ignored the embarrassed slip. “Go
present him with your regrets in person. I’ll give a hop, and invite you
to it. Won’t that be nice? Old Hal won’t care if you are the only one
invited.” She could not refrain from a side-long glance at Marjorie.
“Imagine Hal and me dancing solemnly around your big ball room together,
the only guests at your hop.” Marjorie forced a laughing tone of
raillery.
“Nothing would please him better,” Jerry stoutly maintained. It was the
nearest to an opinion concerning Hal’s and Marjorie’s non-progressive
love affair that wary Jerry had ever ventured.
------------------------------------------------------------------------