Vera was now bringing the roadster to a stop before the Ivy.
“Hello, old stand-by!” Marjorie raised a cheerful hand of greeting
toward the familiar, one-story white stucco building. Its ornamental
bungalow effect was made even more attractive by the traits of English
ivy which wandered across the front of the shop and were trained above
the door and the narrow-paned windows.
“Not another car parked here; glorious! This is a positive streak of
luck!” congratulated Vera.
“The Ivy is popular with tourists this summer,” Leila informed Marjorie
and Robin as the girls sauntered up the wide white stone walk four
abreast. “This is the first time since we came back that we have been
able to park in front of the shop.”
Entering the tea room they steered a straight course for one of four
alcove tables. During the college year these tables were difficult to
secure unless engaged beforehand. All four stood empty now. A brief lull
in the mid-afternoon business of the Ivy had found the prosperous shop
temporarily deserted.
“Who ever before saw an alcove table at the Ivy empty?” commented Robin
as the chums seated themselves.
“It’s almost as still here today as in chapel after Prexy has read out
an amazing notice,” declared Vera lightly.
“Observe how soon that chapel-like atmosphere will depart. We are here,”
Leila reminded.
“No; this beatific state of sweet silence is due to be shattered this
very minute,” Robin agreed.
“Right you are, Robin. It’s a grand palaver we’re about to have. Let us
order the luncheon before the gabble party begins,” proposed Leila.
“Consomme, chicken à la king, potato straws, cucumber salad and whatever
your sweet tooth demands for dessert? Yes?” She turned inquiring eyes on
her friends. “And a pot of tea, of course?”
“It suits me. I wish I were going to eat that dandy luncheon this
minute. I’m so hungry,” sighed Marjorie.
Vera and Robin echoed Marjorie’s wish. The waitress obligingly promised
to hurry the consommé to the hungry quartette and retired briskly
kitchen-ward.
“Now who is going to start the gabble ball rolling?” playfully demanded
Vera.
“You and Leila. Tell us about the campus.” Marjorie and Robin answered
in the same words, and together. They both laughed. “One heart, one
mind,” Robin quoted.
“It’s the same dear, green old stamping ground,” Vera answered with
proud fondness. “Only it almost gives one the blues to walk from one end
of it to another without seeing any of one’s pals. Now for news. Let me
see. Kathie is coaching four would-be-freshies who are staying at Acasia
House. They’re in for entrance exams. Miss Remson has been away for a
month, but she came back to the Hall the day Leila and I put in an
appearance there. I sha’n’t tell you a thing about Miss Remson’s
vacation trip. She wants to tell you herself. She said so.”
“What an odd busy little woman she is.” Robin smiled at mention of the
brisk little manager of Wayland Hall. “I love her funny abrupt ways. She
is so original.”
“Jerry named her Busy Buzzy almost as soon as she first saw her when we
went to Wayland Hall as freshies,” reminisced Marjorie. “Muriel was
quite fascinated by the name and those two villains went on calling Miss
Remson Busy Buzzy behind her back for a long while. I was always afraid
she might hear them say it, but thank goodness she never did. Muriel
used to call Hortense Barlow, her roommate, Mortense. She and Jerry had
the naming habit very hard that year.”
Muriel’s name brought a grin to Leila’s face. “That rascal,” she said
with a chuckle. “What might she be doing these fine summer days? Is she
coming back to college, Beauty? When we asked her last June about it she
would tell us nothing. All she would offer was: ‘I can’t say. I’ll have
to think it over.’”
“She’s still saying it,” Marjorie echoed the chuckle. “She won’t tell
even Jerry and me what she intends to do about coming back. Jerry says
she is only trying to tease us, but I think she has a reason for saying
she is uncertain about it. She’ll tell us when she is ready and not a
minute before. Muriel has always been just so.”
“I’ll tell you all a bit of news,” put in Robin. “Elaine is going to be
married. Her engagement will be announced next month. She is——”
Three voices rippled an astonished “Oh-h-h.” Three faces reflected the
smile with which Robin had announced the news. Elaine Hunter, during her
four years at Hamilton, had been the most popular girl at Silverton
Hall.
“Who is Elaine going to marry, Robin?” asked Vera interestedly. “He’ll
have to be a wonder to be worthy of her.”
“A delightful young civil engineer. His name is Kingdon Barrett. It is a
real romance,” Robin went on eagerly. “When Elaine was a tiny girl and
this Mr. Barrett a small boy they used to go to the same beach every
summer with their parents. They played together on the sand and were
good friends. Then the Barretts went West and Elaine never saw her boy
playmate again until Commencement. He was visiting Prexy’s son and saw
her name on the Commencement program. He actually picked her out among
the graduates. The moment he had a chance he had Prexy Matthews, who
knows her family well, introduce him to her. He told her who he was.
They promptly fell in love and now they’re engaged. Can you beat that?”
Robin spread open both hands in a challenging gesture.
“We can not. Nor is it likely that we shall try. I have no wish to fall
in love, for isn’t it true that I might never be able to fall out again?
It is a pit that I shall keep my feet well away from,” declared Leila
with unsentimental wisdom.
“I can’t imagine you in love, you ridiculous girl,” Vera’s infectious
giggle went the round of the table.
“Ah, if I were; and what a fine frenzy I should be in. Like this,” Leila
rolled her eyes, put on a lovelorn expression and struck her hand to her
forehead with tragic force. She immediately rubbed her hand. “Arrah, but
I have a hard forehead,” she remarked ruefully.
The return of the waitress with the consomme put a momentary check on
the animated rolling of what Vera had whimsically called the “gabble
ball.” The instant the hungry girls began their soup they resumed
conversation. While Leila and Vera had many news items germane to the
campus to relate, none of them were of moment. Robin had much concerning
herself and Phylis Moore, her cousin, now a senior, to tell. Marjorie’s
news centered on Jerry’s, Lucy’s, Muriel’s and her own doings during
vacation. Of Ronny she had almost no news to relate. She had received
but one letter from her since Ronny had sped West to her beautiful ranch
home in California. The news of Elaine Hunter’s engagement was, thus
far, the banner surprise.
“Oh, girls, have you seen Miss Susanna since you came?” was Marjorie’s
concerned question, as the four lingered over the dessert of maple
mousse and _petit fours_. “I’ve been trying to ask you that question
from the first, and haven’t.”
“Now what makes you think we have seen her?” countered Leila with an
elaborately innocent air.
“That means you have,” Marjorie translated, “and you,” she pointed an
accusing finger at Leila, “and you,” the finger moved on to Vera, “are
trying to keep something from me. I know _you’re_ not guilty, Robin.
_You_ look innocent. But this pair look suspicious; oh, very
suspicious.”
“Now, Beauty, on your honor, do I look as though there was anything I
could refuse to tell you, provided I knew it?” ingratiated Leila, her
bright blue eyes a-twinkle. She appeared to be wrestling with a secret
mirth which threatened to overrun her mischievous face. She now made
mysterious signs to Vera whose smiles were also in evidence.
“You look too tantalizing for words. So does Vera. Oh, I know you both!”
“So you take us for a precious pair of rogues; eh, Beauty!” Leila made a
smiling failure of trying to appear reproachful. “Never mind. Midget and
Leila forgive you. Bring forth the mystic writing, Midget. May Beauty’s
bad opinion of us fly away on swift wings!”