“Marjorie Dean-n! Oo-oo; oo-oo! Mar-r-jo-r-ie D-e-an!”
Marjorie turned sharply as the long resonant call was borne to her ears
on the crisp fall air. Speeding toward her across the campus came a tall
girl, hands cupped to her lips. She was running with a certain
individual, energetic swing of body which Marjorie recognized as
belonging to but one student at Hamilton. Sight of her brought a sunny
smile to Marjorie’s somewhat serious face.
“Gussie Forbes,” she cried, “are you really here at last. She held out
both hands to the tall handsome sophomore whose own face was radiant.
“I am, but I’m surprised to think that I ever reached here.” Gussie
grasped the welcoming hands and shook them with vigor. “I’ve been at
Wayland Hall about fifteen minutes. I asked where you were, first thing.
Miss Remson said she thought you were somewhere on the campus, so out I
hustled to try to find you.”
“Faithful Gussie. What can I do to reward such devotion?” laughed
Marjorie.
“Come back to the Hall with me and be the feature of a rejoicing bow-wow
in Flossie’s and my room,” came the prompt return. “We’re all simply
perishing to see you and the rest of the Sanfordites. Is Miss Lynde
back? I never dare call her Ronny, though I think she’s a perfect dear.”
Gussie linked an arm in one of Marjorie’s and began towing her gently
toward the Hall.
“Ronny’s here. She stopped at Sanford for us on her way from California.
Jerry, Lucy, Ronny and I came back together. Muriel’s not coming back
this year.”
“Oh, dear!” wailed Gussie. “That’s bad news. Muriel is such a lot of
fun. I only knew her well toward the last of the college year, but we
were getting quite chummy.”
“We’re all sorry Muriel isn’t with us.” Marjorie’s face fell at the
remembrance. “We’re going to miss her dreadfully. We tried to coax her
to come with us, but she said ‘no’ and wouldn’t give a reason for saying
it. She’s been very mysterious about it.”
“Haven’t you the least idea of why she isn’t coming back?” questioned
Gussie curiously.
“No. She insists that she isn’t engaged to be married. That would be her
strongest reason for not coming back.”
“Aggravating old goose,” was Gussie’s fond opinion of Muriel. “Look out
she isn’t simply kidding you. I’ll bet she’s engaged.”
“You asked for Ronny. There she is now on the steps.” Marjorie waved a
gay signal to Veronica Lynde, who answered it in kind.
“She sent me a set of ducky postcards from Lower California this summer.
I was so surprised. I never thought she’d do that.” Gussie spoke humbly.
“You’ve a bad case of too much respect for Ronny,” laughed Marjorie. “If
she discovers it she will give you a good shaking.”
“I wish she would,” sighed Gussie. “I’d feel more at home with her
afterward. I behaved like a savage to you last year. I’m sure Miss Lynde
hasn’t forgiven me for that. She was pleasant with me after I turned
civilized, but never friendly.”
A smile dimpled the corners of Marjorie’s mouth. “It’s all right,” she
cheered downcast Gussie. “You’re friends with Ronny, only you didn’t
know it. She loathes writing letters, or even postcards. You’ve had the
sign and seal of her friendship.”
“Ha-a-a-a! Tell you that’s fine news,” Gussie instantly brightened.
As the two girls neared Ronny she came down the steps and advanced to
meet them. “So glad to see you again.” She greeted Augusta with a warmth
which completely assured the doubting sophomore of her friendliness.
“And what have _you_ been doing, Miss M. M. Dean?” she humorously
interrogated Marjorie.
“I’d started for Silverton Hall to see Robin and Phil. Phil has a great
idea she wants to tell Robin and me about. Now the great idea will have
to wait. I’m going to a pow-wow in Gussie’s room.”
“No one invited me to a pow-wow.” Ronny turned reproachful eyes on
Gussie. “I enjoy pow-wows far more than Marjorie does.”
“I invite you to one this minute. Excuse my seeming neglect. I’ve been
at the Hall just long enough to set down my luggage and start out to
find Marjorie. Double delighted to find your Highness, too.” Gussie made
Ronny an exaggerated, respectful bow. Now sure of Ronny’s approval she
entered blithely into the spirit of Veronica’s teasing remarks.
“Will you ask Jerry and Lucy to come and meet the gang in my room?”
Gussie was in a pleasant flutter of excitement as the trio reached the
second floor of the Hall. “Flossie went for Leila and Vera. They’re
probably at the party now.”
“I’ll answer for Jerry, and trot her to the pow-wow directly,” Marjorie
promised.
“Lucy’s still in our room. I think. You may expect us.” Ronny returned
Gussie’s salute with one equally extravagant and disappeared into her
room.
“She’s a perfect love! I won’t need that shaking after all,” Gussie
confided to Marjorie with sparkling eyes as the two separated briefly.
Marjorie hurried lightly down the hall and opened the door of Room 15.
“Hello, Jeremiah,” she greeted; “Gussie Forbes is back. We’re invited to
a pow-wow in her room this very moment.”
“Well, well, well; you don’t mean it.” Jerry Macy looked up with an
incredulous grin from the letter she was writing.
“Yes, I do mean it.” Marjorie pounced upon Jerry and tried to pull her
up from her chair. Jerry grinningly braced herself and remained firm.
“You can’t do it, Marvelous Manager. I’m someone you can’t manage. So
Gentleman Gus is going to have a pow-wow! Shall Jeremiah attend it, or
finish her letter? Which? What?” Jerry had applied the nickname
“Gentleman Gus,” to Augusta Forbes because of the number of male rôles
the tall, broad-shouldered sophomore had played in campus shows during
her freshman year.
“You’ll attend it,” was Marjorie’s threatening prediction as she began a
fresh onslaught upon her apparently stationary chum. “If I can’t haul
you up from that chair I’ll go for reinforcements. Then we’ll see
what’ll happen.”
“Just see what’s happened already.” Jerry sprang up from the chair.
“Why, Bean, respected Bean, excuse me. I nearly tipped you over, didn’t
I?” she innocently apologized as she bumped smartly against her
roommate.
“Oh, never mind. You don’t know any better,” Marjorie made charitable
allowance as she tucked her arm in Jerry’s and moved resolutely toward
the door.
In front of the closed door of Gussie’s room Marjorie smiled and raised
a finger. Inside a merry babel of fresh young voices told them the
pow-wow was in full swing. Marjorie tapped lightly on the door. No one
answering, she turned the knob and she and Jerry entered the room.
Ronny, Lucy, Leila and Vera formed a group around which the five
sophomore chums known to their friends as the Bertramites had gathered.
At sight of Marjorie and Jerry a mild shout went up from the assembled
nine. Gussie made a jubilant dash from the group to receive them.
“For goodness sake, girls, moderate your whoops of joy,” cautioned
Flossie Hart when she could make herself heard above the commotion. “The
Hall is full of young and timid freshies. This warning isn’t meant for
you P. G.’s,” she laughingly excepted. “Only the Bertramites are
included in it.”
“A pow-wow is a pow-wow. I’m surprised at you, Floss,” reproved Calista
Wilmot with a giggle.
“Remember eats are necessary at a pow-wow. Trot out whatever you happen
to have in your suitcases that’s eatable,” Gussie ordered. “I’ve a
five-pound box of chocolate nuts. Next? That means Floss, Calista,
Charlotte and Anna. The rest of you are company and have to be
entertained.”
Gussie cleared the center table with one or two energetic sweeps of the
arm. Her chums began a prompt diving into bags and suitcases for their
contributions to the feast. Calista produced a pasteboard box of
macaroons, Flossie one of salted almonds, Anna a sweet grass basket of
stuffed dates and Charlotte Robbins a box of home-made maple and
chocolate fudge and a large jar of tiny sour pickles.
“There.” Gussie arranged the toothsome array of delicacies on the table
to her satisfaction. “Here’s to our noble P. G.’s,” she proposed,
flourishing an arm. “Long may they wave. Hurrah, hurrah, hurrah!”
The five Bertramites came out lustily on the hurrahing. The room rang
with their gleeful shouts.
The echoes of them had hardly died out before the six guests were
returning the compliment quite as vociferously. They continued to make
plenty of pleasant noise as they sampled the sweets and rushed from one
topic of girl interest to another.
“Someone is rapping on the door.” Leila’s quick ears were the first to
catch the sound.
“I’ll go.” Gussie hurried to the door, a pickle in one hand, a square of
maple fudge in the other. She transferred the pickle to the fudge hand
and opened the door.
“Why, Miss Remson!” Her eyes widened in surprise. “Come in. We’re having
a jollification. You are just in time for it.”
“Glad to join in the fun.” The manager’s tones were utterly friendly.
“I’m the bearer of wet-blanket news, though. Miss Monroe, next door to
this room, has just complained of the noise going on here. She has an
examination in mathematics tomorrow and insists upon quiet so that she
can study. I’m sorry, children.” A good-humored smile overspread her
face. “You’ll have to try to play more quietly.”
“Why, the idea! We haven’t been here an hour yet, and it’s so early in
the afternoon!” Gussie burst forth half resentfully. “Pardon me, Miss
Remson. I don’t mean that for you. I mean it for fussy Miss Monroe,
whoever she may be. Talk about pure freshie nerve!” Gussie’s eyes
traveled the group of now silent students for sympathy. She found it in
the common expression of blank, half-sheepish surprise written large on
her friends’ faces.
“Miss Monroe isn’t a freshman, Augusta,” the manager corrected gently.
“She is trying the examinations this week which will admit her to the
sophomore class. I explained to her that you and Miss Hart were
sophomores, hoping she might make allowance.”
“A would-be soph, and complaining of the sophs! What a loyal addition to
the sophie class she will be,” Florence Hart cried sarcastically.
“Not wishing to be too inquisitive, Miss Remson, may I ask if Miss
Monroe insisted you should come and tell us what a noisy crowd we were?”
Leila inquired smoothly.
“Yes, Leila; she did,” the little woman replied in her concise way.
“Now why, I wonder, did she not come and tell us herself?” Leila’s tones
were silky, but her blue eyes had narrowed.
Miss Remson laughed. “Clever Leila,” she regarded the Irish girl with
approbation. “I may as well tell you girls frankly. Miss Monroe put it
to me as my duty to reprimand you. I hope you won’t consider my enforced
word of caution in the nature of a reprimand,” she ended with the
independence of affection.
A chorus of loyal assurances went up which caused her to raise a
premonitory hand and incline her head in the direction of the next room.
After stopping long enough to eat a square of fudge and two pickles with
true schoolgirl appetite she left behind her an ominously quiet crowd of
girls.
“A nice reputation you have as a P. G., Jeremiah Macy.” Jerry severely
addressed herself in the mirror of a dressing table. “Just think”—she
turned accusingly toward Lucy Warner—“even Luciferous Warniferous, the
Sanford sage, got a hot shot for being too boisterous.”
“Don’t blame me. Blame the company I keep,” chuckled Lucy.
“Luciferous Warniferous couldn’t be boisterous if she tried,” defended
Ronny. “She hasn’t said half a dozen words since I led her into this
room. I know she hasn’t whooped once. Can you whoop, Luciferous? That’s
what I’d love to know?” Ronny peered owlishly at Lucy.
“Don’t give a demonstration of it till we are out on the campus,” warned
Anna Perry. Her inflection was sarcastic. “It’s not safe here.”
“I sha’n’t give one at any time or at any place,” Lucy retorted with
great firmness.
“The very idea,” scolded Flossie Hart. “Why, we made twice as much noise
when we first came to the Hall last year and no one made a fuss.”
“I won’t stand it.” Gussie Forbes shook back her short curls, squared
her shoulders and linked her hands behind her back in the attitude her
chums knew meant battle. “Can’t help it if this Miss Monroe is going to
be a soph. She might have known we’d subside. She could have waited a
little to see. I won’t be mean enough to say I hope she flunks in math.
But I’ll say she’ll flunk in popularity if she can’t live and let live.”