this time I had been planning to ask Mrs. Dean, in my most ingratiating manner, if she thought she might possibly make room for a certain very frisky member of my family for a while. I had intended to proceed carefully and diplomatically so that she wouldn't be too much shocked at such a prospect, but now – "
"It's all settled, isn't it, Mother?" interrupted Marjorie. "You are just as anxious as I for Mary to come and live with us, aren't you?"
"Shall I stop the car in the middle of the street and assure you of my willingness to increase my regiment?" laughed Mrs. Dean.
"No, no," protested Marjorie. "Let's hurry home as fast as we can and talk it over. We're only two squares from our house now. Besides, I've planned everything already. Mary can have the spare bedroom next to my house." Marjorie always referred to her room as her "house." "There's only the bath between and we'll use that together, and have a regular house of our own. Oh, Mary, won't it be perfectly splendid?"
Regardless of what passersby might think, Mary and Marjorie embraced with an enthusiasm that threatened to land them both in the tonneau of the rapidly moving car, while their elders smiled at this reckless display of affection.
The automobile had hardly come to a full stop on the broad driveway, that wound through the wide stretch of lawn that was one of the chief beauties of the Deans' pretty home, when Marjorie swung open the door and skipped nimbly out of the car with, "Welcome home, Mary!"
Mary was only an instant behind Marjorie in leaving the car, and the two hugged each other afresh out of pure joy of living.
"Take Mary up to her room at once, dear," directed Mrs. Dean. "I'm sure she must be tired and hungry after her long ride in the train. We will have an early dinner to-night. I expect Mr. Dean home at almost any moment," she continued, turning to Mr. Raymond.
"Come on, Mary." Marjorie had lifted Mary's bag from the automobile. Now she stretched forth an inviting hand to Mary, and piloted her across the lawn and up the short stretch of stone walk to the front door. The door opened and a trim, rosy-cheeked maid appeared as by magic. She reached for Mary's bag, but Marjorie waved her gently aside.
"I'll do the honors, Delia. You can look after mother and Mr. Raymond. We are very self-sufficient persons who don't need anything except a chance to go upstairs and talk ourselves hoarse."
A wide smile irradiated the maid's goodnatured face, as she stepped aside to allow Marjorie and Mary to enter the hall.
"What a darling house!" Mary's glance traveled about the pretty Dutch hall to the large, comfortable living room beyond. "You have oceans of room here, haven't you?"
Marjorie nodded. "Yes; when first we came here I felt lost. It was actually lonesome. It took me a whole week to grow accustomed to looking out without seeing rows of brick houses across the street and on each side of me. Don't you remember, I wrote you all about it? You see, I didn't enter high school until we'd been here almost two weeks, and in all that time I never met a single girl. I felt like a shipwrecked sailor on a great, big, lonely, old island. Shall we go upstairs now? I'm so anxious to have you see my 'house.' It's a house within a house, you know. Mother had it all done up in pink and white for me, and I spent hours in it. Your house is blue. I made general and captain let me have one of the spare bedrooms done in blue, so that when you came to visit me you'd feel at home. And now it's going to be your very own for a whole year! It's too good to be true."
Releasing Mary's hand, Marjorie led the way up the stairs to the second floor and down the short hall to her "house." Mary cried out in admiration at her friend's dainty room. She walked about, exclaiming over its perfect details after the manner of girls, then three minutes later the two somehow found themselves seated side by side on Marjorie's pretty white bed, their arms about each other's waists, and fairly launched into one of the good, old-time confabs they were wont to indulge in when the top step of the Deans' veranda in B – had been their favorite trysting place.
Half an hour later Mrs. Dean entered the room to find them still talking at an alarming rate, the rest of their world apparently forgotten.
"I might have known it," she smiled. "Why, you haven't even taken off your hats, and dinner will be ready in ten minutes. Marjorie, you are a most neglectful hostess."
"Oh, we don't mind having dinner with our hats on," returned Marjorie cheerfully. Then, rising, she took off her broad-brimmed Panama, and began gently pulling the pins from Mary's hat. "Make it fifteen minutes, instead of ten, Captain, and we'll be as spick and span as you please."
"Discipline seems to be very lax in these barracks," commented Mrs. Dean. "I am afraid I ought to call upon General to help me enforce my orders. Under the circumstances I'll be lenient, though, and stretch the time to fifteen minutes. There, I hear General downstairs now!"
She disappeared from the doorway and immediately a great scurrying about began, punctuated with much talk and laughter. To Marjorie it seemed as though she had not been so happy for ages. It was wonderful to know that her beloved Mary was actually with her once more, and still more wonderful that she would continue to be with her indefinitely.
At dinner she beamed joyously across the table at the little blue-eyed girl, while their elders discussed and settled her destiny for the coming year. Mr. and Mrs. Dean met Mr. Raymond's request in behalf of his daughter with the whole-heartedness that so characterized them. In fact, they were highly in favor of receiving Mary as a member of their little household.
"Two soldiers are better than one," asserted Mr. Dean humorously. "I believe in preparedness. 'In times of peace prepare for war,' you know. With such a valiant army under my command I could do wonders if attacked by the enemy."
After dinner they all repaired to the living room, where the discussion of the all-important subject was continued, and when at eleven o'clock two sleepy, but blissfully happy, lieutenants climbed the stairs to bed, Mary Raymond lacked nothing except actual adoption papers, signed and sealed, to admit her into the Deans' hospitable fold.
Yet there was one tiny drawback to Mary's joy. Try as she might she could not forget Constance Stevens and Marjorie's too evident fondness for her. From Marjorie's early letters she had formed the conclusion that Constance was merely a poor nobody, whom her chum, with her usual spirit of generosity had tried to befriend. Marjorie's later letters had contained little pertaining to Constance. Mary had not known of the long period of estrangement between Constance and Marjorie that had so nearly wrecked their budding friendship, and of the many changes that time had wrought in the life of the girl who looked like her. She had, therefore, been quite unprepared to meet the dainty, well-dressed young woman whom Marjorie appeared to hold in such strong affection. She reflected that night, a trifle resentfully, after Marjorie had kissed her good-night and left her, that it was very strange in Marjorie not to have put her in possession of the real facts of the case. Still, it was really not her affair. If Marjorie chose to become chummy with Constance without even writing a word of it to her, there was nothing to do except to be silent over the whole affair. Perhaps Marjorie would tell her all about it later. Certainly she would ask no questions. And then and there, little, blue-eyed Mary Raymond made her first mistake, and sowed a tiny seed of discord in her jealous heart that was fated later to bear bitter fruit.
CHAPTER IV
INTRODUCING MARY TO THE GIRLS
"We've come for a last inspection, Captain. How do we look?"
Marjorie Dean danced into her mother's room, her brown eyes sparkling with anticipation, her charming face all smiles. Mary Raymond followed her excited chum.
"Halt! Company, attention!" commanded Mrs. Dean, as she turned from her dressing table to pass an opinion upon the waiting brigade of two. Her
