NEWS FROM MISS SUSANNA
“I’m going out to mail a letter,” Jerry told Marjorie, when, later, the
girls had gone to their own rooms.
“How nice. You may have the pleasure of mailing two for me,” Marjorie
reached in the table drawer for the letters. “I put them in the drawer
for safe keeping and went out without them, she explained.
“Hand them over.” Jerry took them and was gone. She had decided to say
nothing to anyone about the letter she had written to Louise Walker
until she had seen the outcome. Like the sleuth she had laughingly vowed
to be, at the time when Marjorie had received the letter from Louise
Walker and also the one signed “Senior sports’ committee,” she preferred
to keep matters a secret until she had completed her case.
On the way back across the campus from the nearest mail box she saw a
mail carrier leaving the Hall. In going out she had noted that the
bulletin board in the hall was empty of mail. Now a flock of letters
roosted in its alphabetical, shallow pockets. Near the top under D she
plucked one for Marjorie addressed in Miss Susanna Hamilton’s individual
hand.
“You’re in luck,” Jerry said as she entered the room to find Marjorie
sitting at the table, elbows braced upon it, hands cupping her chin. A
rare old book on chemistry lay near her on the table. It had been given
her by Miss Hamilton during her senior year at Hamilton. She had brought
it from her bookshelf to read. Instead she had fallen into a reverie
concerning the giver of the book. Miss Susanna had told her that it was
the only copy of the work on chemistry known to be in the United States.
It had belonged to Mr. Brooke Hamilton. Marjorie could hardly believe at
times that she was actually in possession of a book that had belonged to
the founder of Hamilton College.
“Why am I in luck?” Marjorie’s head was quickly raised from her hands.
“I never seem to be much out of it, Jeremiah. I have so much more of
happiness than I deserve.”
“There’s a reason.” The envelope in Jerry’s hand dropped on the table in
front of Marjorie.
“Oh-h-h!” Marjorie exultantly snatched up the letter. “I was just
thinking of her, Jerry. I’ve had only one letter from her since she has
been in New York. Doesn’t it seem odd to think of Miss Susanna as being
in New York? She’s been away from the Arms almost six weeks, too.”
Marjorie’s hands were already busy with the envelope. She drew from it
the folded letter, spread it open and glanced eagerly at the headlines.
Then she read aloud to Jerry who had seated herself on one end of the
table, feet swinging free.
“MY DEAREST CHILD:
“I am still in this roaring, clattering, over-populated city
they call New York. I shall be glad to see the last of it. It
has changed a good deal since I visited it twenty years ago.
This is the day of motor vehicles, skyscrapers and crowded
streets filled with strange foreign faces. I long to be home to
that haven of peace, the Arms.
“There is no use in attempting to tell you by letter of my stay
in the metropolis. I am coming home on Tuesday, December fourth.
Will you and Jerry come to the Arms to dinner on Wednesday
evening? I should have written you more often, but I have been
very busy by day and tired by night. At any rate I have seen the
New York of today. But I could never grow used to the
helter-skelter, rush-and-a-bounce way of living that appears to
prevail here.
“Give my love to my girls with my fond devotion for yourself.
“SUSANNA CRAIG HAMILTON.”
“She’ll be home tomorrow. Oh, goody!” Marjorie sprang from her chair and
essayed a little prancing step about the room, looking like a delighted
youngster. Miss Susanna’s pet name of “child” was particularly
applicable.
“And Wednesday we’ll see her!” Jerry contributed a few hops and skips to
the dance Marjorie had started. The two met, clasped each other and the
dance became wilder. Breathless and laughing, they landed with a bang
against the door. They managed for a moment to keep out Ronny who was at
the door, hand on the knob, when the dancers crashed against it.
“I got in, even if you did try to hold the door against me,” she
asserted with twinkling eyes.
“My, but you are suspicious!” Jerry accused. “That’s not the way we
treat our friends. Didn’t you know it?”
“Am I really your friend?” Ronny asked with gushing sweetness.
“You were, you are, but you won’t be long if you ask me any more such
foolish questions.”
“Miss Susanna will be home tomorrow, Ronny,” Marjorie said happily. “She
sent her love to you girls. Here’s her letter. I’m sure she’d like you
to read it.” Marjorie was still holding the letter. She now handed it to
Ronny.
Ronny took it and quickly read it. “Why did she go to New York, I
wonder, after having stayed so long away from it?” she questioned half
musingly. “It would take an especially strong reason to draw her away
from the Arms for six weeks.”
“Whatever the reason may have been, we’ll probably know it tomorrow
evening,” Jerry commented. “It wouldn’t surprise me if she’d been
planning something for the dormitory and had had to go to New York to
find just what she wanted.”
“We don’t wish her to do anything more for the dormitory,” Marjorie said
sturdily. “She has done too much for us already.”
“Precisely my opinion. You won’t let me throw my money around in the
dormitory cause. Why should Miss Susanna be allowed to do what I’m not?”
Ronny propounded with one of her dazzling, patronizing smiles.
“I call for a change of subject,” laughed Marjorie.
“And my question not answered,” Ronny sighed plaintively.
“The answer to your question is the road to argument.” Marjorie cannily
shook a finger at Veronica.
“All right. You’ve suppressed me for the time being. Never fear. I’ll
bob up again on the finance question when you least expect it,” she made
cheerful prediction.
“It’s a sweet, precious pet, and it sha’n’t be suppressed.” Marjorie
reached out and stroked Ronny’s arm.
“That’s what you call Ruffle when you are trying to coax him to jump
through your arms. You can’t hope that I’ll be much impressed by such
blarney,” Ronny pointed out with hastily assumed dignity. “I’m going to
leave you now. I came here for a purpose, but I’ve forgotten what it
was. I’ll have to go back to our room and consult Luciferous. Luckily, I
confided in her before starting out.” Ronny flitted from the room in her
graceful, light-footed fashion.
“I wish I could see fluffy old Ruffle and squabble with him and General
for our favorite chair.” Marjorie’s eyes grew suddenly wistful. “And,
Captain! I miss her most of all. More so this year than I did before I
was graduated.”
“I miss Father and Mother sometimes, but Hal is the one I miss.” Jerry’s
color heightened a little as she mentioned her brother’s name to
Marjorie. “You know Hal and I were pally at home. Outside the house he
was always with the boys, but inside we spent many hours together. He
taught me to box, fence, swim and ride. And during the past two summers
at the beach you’ve seen for yourself how much we have been together.”
During the short Thanksgiving vacation in Sanford Jerry had been faintly
encouraged by Marjorie’s warmly cordial manner to Hal. The strain
between them which her keen intuition had detected when at the beach had
vanished. As a matter of fact, Marjorie welcomed the four days of
pleasure and happiness at home as a release from responsibility. She
wished to think of nothing but home and its charms. She hailed Hal
frankly as her cavalier of old and treated him with all the gay
graciousness of her first acquaintance with him.
Hal was too deeply in love with Marjorie not to understand her. He knew
that she was not behaving toward him according to some carefully laid
plan of her own. Her overflowing gaiety was spontaneous. She was like a
blithe, lovely child, full of the joy of living, who looked to him to be
her playmate. So Hal made a Herculean effort to crowd the love she did
not want into his heart and close the door upon it. He resolutely
forbade himself to think of her as other than his old-time “girl.”
“Hal is the finest young man I ever met, or ever expect to meet,”
Marjorie said with an energy of enthusiasm far removed from love. “I
hope he will find a girl who is as splendid as he is, and marry her. I
wish Hal would fall in love with Ronny, and Ronny with Hal. They would
be worthy of each other.”
Marjorie laughed as she caught the variety of expressions struggling for
place on Jerry’s round face. “You look so funny, Jeremiah.”
“Can you wonder? Ronny never occurred to me in the light of a
sister-in-law.” Jerry’s variegated expression dissolved in a broad
smile. “You take my breath. I’ll have to mention it to her when she
comes in again. Her views on the subject might give me another shock.”
“Jerry Macy, if you do, I’ll—I’ll—” Marjorie caught Jerry by her
well-cushioned shoulders and began to shake her with playful force.
“Don’t you dare, Jeremiah.” She emphasized her words with little shakes.
“Promise me you won’t.”
“What do you take me for?” Jerry asked reproachfully. “I’d never have
the nerve to mention old Hal to Ronny. No, Marvelous Match Maker, you’ll
never be able to marry Hal off so easily as that. There are scads and
oodles and slathers of lovely girls in the world, but there’s one grand
reason why none of them will ever give me a glad hand as a
sister-in-law. Hal saw you first.”
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