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CHAPTER III. – “SOMETHING TO REPORT”

“Tomorrow? Let me think.” Marjorie’s dark brows drew thoughtfully together. “Why, I’m not going anywhere, Hal.” Marjorie made an effort to be casual which was only half successful. “I’m going to be busy packing. I shall have to take an early train for Hamilton on Thursday morning so as not to reach there late at night. I won’t have a minute’s spare time Thursday morning. I’ll have to be ready as ready can be on Wednesday night.”

The boating party had left the Oriole once more tied to the pier and had strolled back along the sands to Cliff House. To her surprised relief, Hal had not attempted to renew the subject she dreaded to discuss. In fact he had had very little to say. Responsive to this new mood of his she had walked beside him almost in silence, smiling at the animated discussion Jerry and Danny kept up all the way to the hotel. Laurie and Connie were as mute as she and Hal. Such understanding silences were characteristic of them, however.

As ardently as he had courted an opportunity to tell Marjorie he loved her Hal now upbraided himself for having been so stupid as to blurt out his feelings “when the gang were around.” He would finish telling her what he had begun to say when Danny and Jerry had interrupted. He was resolved on that point. He was also determined that she should hear him out before she left Severn Beach on her mid-summer trip to Hamilton.

“Can’t you find time to go out in the Oriole with me tomorrow afternoon, Marjorie?” There lurked a trace of stubborn purpose in Hal’s question. “It will be our last sea voyage in the good ship, Oriole, this summer, you know. I suppose you will go from Hamilton back to Sanford.” Hal eyed her almost gloomily.

Marjorie nodded. The two had reached the main entrance of the hotel a trifle ahead of their chums. They now stood waiting at the foot of the wide, ornamental flight of steps which led up to the central veranda of the enormous white stone hotel.

“I’ll try to go for a part of the afternoon, Hal,” she promised, careful to keep reluctance out of her voice. Pinned down to answer directly she had not the stony-heartedness with which Jerry had ticketed her. She could not flatly refuse the invitation of her boy friend of long standing.

“Good work! Which part?” Hal instantly brightened. “Let us settle that point before you have time to change your mind and back out,” he said boyishly.

“The very idea! You only say that, Hal Macy,” Marjorie retorted with playful emphasis. “I’m not a mind changer, nor a backer-out, either.”

“Beg your pardon, and double beg it.” Hal allowed a teasing note to creep into the answer. Already he was feeling less dejected. He had been half afraid that Marjorie might refuse to go for a last ride in the Oriole.

The swift unbidden reflection that Marjorie might not be quite so indifferent to him as he had thought brought a sudden flush to his cheeks and an odd new sense of hope to his sore heart. She could hardly have failed to understand the import of what he had begun to tell her on the way to the boat. Yet she had not refused to go for a ride with him on the morrow. She must surely have guessed the hidden reason for his invitation to her.

“Say, what time, Marjorie,” Hal again urged. “All afternoon would suit me best,” he added boldly.

“You can’t have all afternoon.” Marjorie lightly objected. “I’ll have to hurry like mad in order to squeeze the ride into tomorrow’s program. I’ll be ready to go as soon as luncheon’s over. I must be back at my packing by not a minute later than three o’clock. You and Jerry had better come to our table for luncheon. Is Jerry going with us?” Marjorie made a last attempt to ward off what appeared to be inevitable.

“No, she isn’t. I haven’t asked her,” was the pointed reply. “Thank you, but I won’t be at the hotel until I come up for you. I’m going to Carver’s Island early in the morning to see a crowd of fellows I know who have a bungalow there. You usually have luncheon at one, don’t you? I’ll meet you in the Dresden lounge at half past one. Then we won’t lose any of your precious time,” Hal concluded almost grimly.

“All right,” Marjorie assented. She was glad Hal had used a mildly peremptory tone. She had always admired his courteous, but positive, manner of settling a matter.

“Why in such a hurry?” Laurie questioned indolently as he and Constance now mounted the steps. “You two walked ahead of us as though you were on a training hike. Is that the way to appreciate a heavenly night like this?”

“It is when it’s after ten o’clock and one has to be up and doing by seven tomorrow morning,” flung back Marjorie. “You forget, Mr. Laurie Armitage, that I’m going away, day after tomorrow.” She emphasized each word with a vigorous bob of the head.

“No; none of us have forgotten that, Marjorie,” Laurie bent a sudden warm friendly smile on her.

“We’re going to miss you dreadfully, Lieutenant.” Constance put an arm around Marjorie. The two stood and swayed back and forth schoolgirl fashion.

“Not half so much as I shall,” Hal voiced frank regret. “Marjorie is a real pal. I’m going to miss her at every turn and corner. I’m going to annex myself to the Armitage family and become a pest after Marjorie goes.”

“Go as far as you like, old man,” Laurie invited. “Connie and I will do our best to amuse and cherish you.”

“Cherish! Ah-h-h!” gurgled Danny who had just come up with Jerry. “Such a sweet word! Did anybody ever hear Jurry-miar say it to me?” He rolled his eyes and clasped his hands. “Silence? What? Don’t all speak at once. No? I thought not.”

“No one ever will hear me say it to you,” Jerry told him in a tired tone.

“How ought I to receive such a remark?” Danny eyed her dubiously. “Answer me, Jurry-miar.” He leaned far forward and stared fixedly at Jerry.

Her stolid expression deserted her. She had to laugh at the ludicrous set of Danny’s freckled features. “Oh, never mind,” she conceded. “Let’s be amiable to each other for ten minutes. I’ll hold the stop watch.”

“U-h-h-h!” Danny simulated collapse. “This is so unexpected. Hurry up, gang. Let’s go to the palm grotto for ices. If we hustle, Jur – I mean, Geraldine and I can sit at the same table without snapping at each other. Come, boys,” he beckoned grandly to Hal and Laurie. “Gentlemen will be treated to ices as well as ladies. Think of that!” He smirked patronizingly at the two young men.

“I oughtn’t linger longer,” gaily demurred Marjorie. “Truly, Danny, I – ”

She went to the palm grotto, however, marched there between Hal and Danny. During the enjoyable half hour the young people spent over the ices Hal was his usual jolly, light-hearted self. Marjorie welcomed the change in him from sombre seriousness to his old care-free manner. When she left him with a friendly good night at the door of the Dean’s apartment she could have almost believed him to be the Hal of her high school days, had not the memory of his earnest words flashed across her brain. She could still hear him saying: “I’ve wished always that it would be so with you and me,” in the eager, impassioned fashion which awoke no responsive echo in her heart.

She stepped into the living room her usually bright face so pre-occupied that it at once caught Mrs. Dean’s attention as she smilingly glanced up from the magazine she held.

“I won’t qualify for the early bird class in the morning, I’m afraid,” Marjorie said with the merest suspicion of a smile. “Never mind; I’m going to get up early even if I do lose some sleep.”

“Was that what made you look so sober as you came in, Lieutenant?” Mrs. Dean asked, amused surprise in the question.

“Did I look very sober?” Marjorie quickly countered.

“Very,” emphasized her mother.

“Well,” Marjorie paused, “I felt sober. Where’s General, Captain?” She glanced questioningly toward the next room.

“He and Mr. Macy motored down to Logan Beach this evening to see a game of chess between two expert players, both friends of Mr. Macy’s. He’ll hardly be home before midnight.” Mrs. Dean continued affectionately to watch Marjorie.

“Oh-h-h.” Marjorie dropped down on a low chair. For a moment she sat plaiting little folds in the soft white evening scarf, now fallen into careless disarrangement across one shoulder. “Oh,” she said again. “Er-oh, dear! I’ve something to report, Captain. I wish I hadn’t. I couldn’t report it to General as I can to you. It’s about Hal. He’s going to ask me to marry him. I wish he wouldn’t.”

The vehemence with which Marjorie voiced the disquieting report brought a shadowy flash of concern to her mother’s face. It faded instantly into a distinctly humorous expression.

“How do you know Hal is going to ask you to marry him?” she quizzed, her eyes twinkling. “You’ve heard the old sad tale of Miss Betty Baxter who refused Captain Jones before he axed her.”

“Oh-h, Captain!” Marjorie made a laughing open-armed rush at her mother. “Stop making fun of me. My case isn’t a bit like silly Miss Betty Baxter’s. What an idiotic person she must have been! You see, dearest,” she slid an arm about her mother’s neck. “Why – Hal – ” Her color mounted to her white forehead – “began to ask me down on the beach tonight. Then Danny and Jerry came up to us. They didn’t know what he was saying to me, of course. He surprised me, too.”

Hesitatingly, Marjorie went on to tell her captain of her talk with Hal on the beach which had led up to his impulsive declaration of love. It was not easy to repeat, even to her mother. She had taken a stand behind her mother’s low-backed chair, arms dropped forward. One hand patted a light tattoo on her mother’s shoulder as she talked. Presently her voice trailed off into silence. Her head went down against her mother’s neck.

“Bring over the low stool, Lieutenant,” Mrs. Dean ordered in her briskest “army” tone.

“Yes, Captain.” Quick as a flash Marjorie’s arms dropped from her captain’s shoulders. She left a light kiss on her mother’s soft brown hair, then marched across the room for the stool. She set it down at her captain’s feet, saluted and stood at rigid attention.

“Break ranks. Discipline seems to be still alive in the army,” Mrs. Dean observed with a smile.

“It is.” Marjorie settled herself on the cushioned stool and leaned her elbows on her mother’s knees. She looked up inquiringly, face between hands. “What is it, Captain? You haven’t said one word of what you think about – about Hal and me.”

“I’m thinking for a moment of what I had best say.” Mrs. Dean looked fondly down at the lovely colorful face raised to her own.

For an instant neither spoke. Then Mrs. Dean said with kindly deliberation: “If you loved Hal in the same whole-hearted way in which I believe he loves you, General and I should be glad of your engagement to him. General thinks Hal a man among young men. You know how much that means. We have occasionally discussed your long friendship with Hal and his entire devotion to you. We know that you do not love him. We are sorry that you cannot return his great affection for you.” One hand strayed caressingly over Marjorie’s curls. There followed another brief interval, then: “We wish you to be true to yourself, Lieutenant. That is the order of the day.”

“Dearest and best,” Marjorie reached for her mother’s hands, took them in her own and fondled them; “why, oh, why didn’t I fall in love with Hal as Connie did with Laurie? I don’t know why. I’ll have to tell him so tomorrow and it will hurt me almost as much to say it as it will hurt him to hear it. He’s been such a splendid comfy friend. I can’t bear to say ‘no’ to him, and I can’t say ‘yes.’ It’s a hard detail, Captain, but I must face it as a true soldier should. All I can do is tell Hal frankly, but in the best way I can, that I don’t love him and never shall.”

CHAPTER IV. – I CAN’T GIVE YOU UP, DEAR

“Let me conduct your marvelous majesty to a seat beside the wheel.” Hal offered his hands with a motion of exaggerated gallantry. He caught Marjorie’s hands in his own and half swung her down from the little pier and into the motor boat.

“Thank you, gallant and distinguished skipper,” was Marjorie’s blithe response as she sat down on the small cushioned bench nearest the wheel, guided by Hal’s devoted arm.

“I had no idea you appreciated me so highly.” He managed to keep up the light, bantering tone he had first used. It was not easy. What he longed to say to her as she turned her vivid, sparkling face toward him was: “I love you. I love you.”

“Why shouldn’t I appreciate you?” Marjorie merrily insisted. She was relieved at Hal’s apparently light mood. She hoped it would continue for at least the greater part of the ride. She preferred to ward off the dreaded talk as long as she could. She had agreed with her captain that Hal had the right to be heard; that it was not fair to him to evade longer an understanding with him.

“I don’t know. Why should you?” countered Hal.

“For two splendid reasons. You’re taking me for a ride in the Oriole. Besides, you called me ‘marvelous majesty,’ which is a most flattering title. Oh, Hal Macy!” Marjorie exclaimed with animated irrelevancy; “isn’t this the most heavenly blue and white and gold day? Blue sea, blue sky, white clouds and golden sun!”

“It’s a peach of a day,” he tersely agreed. Marjorie’s declared appreciation of himself brought a half ironical smile to his lips. As usual, it was like that of a child, grateful for benefits. “What port?” he inquired briefly of her as he started the Oriole away from the pier.

“No port,” was Marjorie’s prompt choice; “just a little run out to sea.”

“Right-o.” Hal obediently headed the Oriole seaward. “Look at the crowd!” He indicated with a sweep of an arm the flock of white-winged sail boats and motor launches which thickly dotted the dimpling water. “Every fellow at the beach who owns a boat seems to be out with it today.”

“It’s an ideal day for boating,” Marjorie found herself tritely echoing Hal’s opinion of the weather. Still she could not on the instant think of anything else to say. Her usual fund of gay, amusing conversation had deserted her. She was too honest of spirit to pretend that which she did not feel.

“There’s no danger of a sudden squall, either.” Hal’s interest in the weather appeared to deepen. “This day is what I’d call an old reliable. Storms hardly ever blow up out of such honest-to-goodness blue skies as these.”

“That’s true.” Marjorie inwardly derided herself for being such an utter stupid. She tried to make herself believe that it was only Hal, her boy chum, with whom she was out boating. She could not. The young man at the wheel whose familiar handsome features were touched with an intensity of purpose quite foreign to them was all but a stranger to her. In the past she had had only rare, disquieting glimpses of the intense side Hal was showing today.

A flat, uncomfortable silence suddenly drifted down upon them. Hal’s courteous attempt to talk trivialities, simple because he knew that was what Marjorie preferred him to do was a failure. He had come to the place where he could no longer continue to hide his heart from her.

The silence between them continued; deepened. Both had begun to feel the tensity of the situation. Both had tried to talk pleasantries and both had failed. Hal occupied himself with sending the Oriole scudding cleverly in and out among the numerous pleasure craft, large and small which dotted the course he was steadily taking toward quieter more aloof waters.

Now and again they were briskly hailed by the occupants of other passing boats. Hal lightened momentarily as he answered the merry salutations, then relapsed into somber gravity.

“What a lot of people you know at Severn Beach, Hal.” Marjorie was glad to find her voice again. Hal was waving an acknowledgment to a noisy, rollicking crew of young men in a passing power launch who had sent out a ringing hail to him.

“I only know a bunch of yachtsmen and a few other fellows.” Hal disclaimed popularity with a shrug of his broad shoulders. “The Clipper, my racing sailboat, is better known along this coast than I am. Oh, but she’s a winner!” Hal brightened with pride of ownership. “She won every race I entered her for last summer. She’s won two this season, and she’s entered in a spiffy race the yacht club is going to pull off in a couple of weeks. You’d better stay at the beach and see it. I’ll take you aboard for the race, if you’ll stay.” Half laughingly, half pleadingly he offered this bribe.

“That would be glorious; to be in a real race!” Marjorie looked her regret. “You’re always so good to me, Hal; always planning some perfectly dandy stunt just to please me. But you know how it is about Hamilton. I feel it truly a sacred obligation; my work there, I mean. I couldn’t allow personal pleasure to come before it.”

“No; nor love, either,” Hal burst forth with a hurt vehemence which brought the hot blood to Marjorie’s cheeks. “I beg your pardon, Marjorie,” he said almost immediately afterward. “I spoke on impulse. Still, that’s the way I feel about your going back to Hamilton next fall when I love you so dearly and want you to marry me. I wish you cared even half as much for me as you do for your work at Hamilton. But you don’t care at all.”

“I do care for you, Hal, as one of the best friends I have,” Marjorie protested, raising her brown eyes sorrowfully to Hal’s clouded face.

“I know,” Hal rejoined a shade less forcefully. “I value your friendship, Marjorie, more highly than I can say. But friendship’s not what I want from you, dear girl. I love you, truly and forever. I’ve loved you since first you came to Sanford to live. I’d have told you so long ago but you never gave me an opportunity.” Hal paused. He regarded Marjorie wistfully; questioningly.

“I – I know it, Hal,” she admitted reluctantly, but with her usual honesty. “I – I haven’t wished you to talk of love to me. There were times last winter” – she stopped in confusion – “when I thought you cared – a little. I – I wasn’t sure.”

“Be very sure of it, now.” Hal’s reply was a mixture of tenderness and dejection.

“I don’t want you to love me, Hal,” Marjorie cried out almost sharply in her desire to be emphatic. “Last night, after what you said to me on the beach, I couldn’t help but be sure. I – I told Captain of it. I always tell her everything. Captain is sorry I don’t love you. She and General are fond of you. They’d be happy if we were – if we were – to become engaged.” Marjorie spoke the last words hesitatingly.

“I’m glad you told your mother. You know how fine I think both General and Captain are.” Hal fought back the hurt look that threatened to invade his face. He gripped the wheel until his knuckles stood out whitely against the sun-tanned brown of his hands.

Marjorie caught a glimpse of the unhappiness which sprang straight from her old comrade’s sore heart and into his eyes.

“There; I’ve hurt you, Hal! Truly I never meant to!” she exclaimed in quick contrition.

“Never mind me.” Hal made a gesture of self-depreciation. “It isn’t your fault because you can’t find it in your heart to love me.” He forced a smile, proudly trying to conceal his own desolation of spirit.

Her eyes remorsefully fixed on him the smile did not deceive Marjorie. Hal’s tensity of feature informed her of the weight of the blow she had just dealt him.

“Please, please, Hal, forgive me!” she begged with a sudden excess of pained humility.

“Forgive you? For what?” Hal bent a fond questioning glance on Marjorie’s troubled face.

“For – for – not loving you,” she faltered. “It hurts me dreadfully to know that I must be the one to make you unhappy. Forgive me for seeming to be so hard and unsympathetic about love. I’ve never thought of it for myself. It has always seemed vague and far away; like something not a part of my life. I know the love between Connie and Laurie is wonderful. I can appreciate their devotion to each other. I have the greatest impersonal reverence for love and lovers. But for me life means endeavor and the glory of achievement.”

The voice of ambitious, inspirited youth sang in her tones, half appealing though they were. Came an embarrassed stillness between them. Hal’s face, strong, even stern in its self-repression was turned partly away from her. The bleakness of his suffering young soul peered forth from his deep blue eyes as he stared steadily across the dimpling sun-touched waves.

“Nothing matters in life but love. To love and to be loved in return,” he said slowly, but with a kind of fatalistic decision. “You’ll love someone, someday, even though you can’t love me.” The shadow on Marjorie’s face deepened as she listened. It was almost as though in a flash of second sight Hal were telling her a fortune she did not care to hear. “When love truly comes to you, then you’ll understand what you can’t understand now,” he ended.

“I don’t want love to come to me. I don’t wish to understand it,” Marjorie made sad protest. “Since it isn’t in my heart to love you, I should never wish to love any one else. You’re the finest, gentlest, truest boy I’ve ever known, Hal, or ever expect to know.”

Hal’s half averted face was suddenly turned toward Marjorie. Across it flashed a rare sweet smile which lived long afterward in her memory. “It’s as I told you last night, Marjorie Dean. You haven’t grown up.” Tender amusement had mercifully broken into and lightened his gloom. “You only think you have,” he said. Marjorie’s naive avowal had brought with it a faint stirring of new hope.

“Yes, Hal, I’ve grown up,” Marjorie began seriously. “It’s not – ”

“You’ll never really grow up until love finds the way to your heart,” Hal interrupted with gentle positiveness. “I hope when it does it will be love for me. I can’t give you up, dear. I’m going to call you ‘dear’ this once. I’d rather have your friendship than the love of any other girl in the world. I’m going to wait for you to grow up.”