We can’t hold the meeting in one of our rooms. We must have plenty of space for our new Travelers. The living room down stairs isn’t private enough. Has anyone a really brilliant suggestion. No other kind is desired. Save your breath.”
“I have. Hold the meeting in our library,” proposed Lillian Wenderblatt. “I’ll put a sign on the library door before dinner tomorrow night: ‘Professor Wenderblatt: Keep Out,’ and lead Father to the door to look at it. Then he won’t bolt into the room with maybe two or three other professors in the middle of our meeting.”
Lillian’s proposal was received with approbation and accepted with alacrity. Leila, Vera, Robin and Lillian were chosen to notify the fortunate seniors of the honor in store for them. The rest of the details of the meeting were quickly arranged. Ten-thirty was not far off.
“Don’t imagine for a minute that you have seen the last of your initiation,” Jerry informed Phil and Barbara, a threatening gleam in her eye. “There are still those two degrees, you know.”
“Oh, forget them. We shall,” Phil made untroubled return.
“You may forget, but I – nevv-vur.” Jerry struck an attitude.
“Nor I.” Muriel dramatically tapped her chest and glared at Phil. “’Sdeath to all quitters,” she hissed.
“Oh, glorious for my melodrama!” admired Robin. “You and Jeremiah shall be the villains.”
“I choose to be the principal, double-dyed scoundrel of the show,” stipulated Muriel, “or else I’ll refuse to see your play. I spurn anything and everything but complete villainy.”
“Give me a better part than Muriel or I won’t act,” balked Jerry.
“I’m going to fly before any more actors go on a strike,” Robin raised a protesting hand. “I must look out for Page and Dean’s melodramer.”
“Only birds, insects, aviators and ‘sich’ fly,” criticized Phil. “I simply must get back at you for not giving me a cousinly warning of what was in store for me tonight.”
“Seniors, P. G.’s and faculty will add to the flying classification or lose what shreds of reputation for integrity they have left,” laughed Kathie.
“An added word of warning: – Hotfoot it lightly.” Jerry’s forceful if inelegant injunction sent the initiation party down the hall dutifully smothering their easily summoned mirth. Jerry accompanied the party to the head of the stairs. She returned to the room, keeping an alert watch as she walked on a certain door across the hall. This time she noted with satisfaction that it was tightly closed.
CHAPTER VII
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.
Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.
Текст
