Читать книгу: «Marjorie Dean's Romance», страница 10

CHAPTER XXIII
A GREAT DAY FOR THE CAMPUS

Julia Peyton could have forgiven Doris Monroe for disagreeing with her. To be told by Doris that she was an object of dislike to the lovely sophomore was not to be borne. She held frequent indignant consultations with her roommate, Clara Carter, on the double subject of the ingratitude of Doris and the snippiness of Marjorie Dean. Julia had not forgiven Marjorie for her “interference” at the Rustic Romp.

Thus far she had not voiced the gossip on the campus that the foolish-faced farmer at the hop had been Leslie Cairns. She was a little afraid that such a bit of gossip on her part might bring down upon her Marjorie’s displeasure. She knew in her heart that she was the only one of the four girls who would be likely to spread the story. Later on, when the Romp had been forgotten she would tell her friends about that horrid Miss Cairns and how she had stealthily slipped into the social side of Hamilton under cover.

Finding the desire to gossip irresistible she and Clara Carter entertained a soph with the tale one evening in their room. The soph, Lena Marsden, a quiet studious girl, had a flourishing crush on Doris. She promptly acquainted Doris with the ill news under promise of secrecy. “If some one like Miss Mason or Miss Harper, or any of the P. G.’s who have poise and influence would reprimand Miss Peyton, maybe she’d not talk about it any more.” was Lena’s opinion.

Leslie’s repeated unkind and untruthful estimate of Marjorie had tended to destroy Doris’s confidence in her, at least. Julia herself had spoken slightingly of Hamilton’s most popular post graduate. Doris decided that of the seven post graduates she knew the two most likely to command the difficult silence of Julia were Veronica Lynne and Leila Harper. Her final choice fell upon Leila. She and Leila had grown quite friendly as the rehearsals of “The Knight of the Northern Sun” progressed. As her Norse lover, Godoran, Augusta Forbes and Doris had also progressed from stiff civility to real friendliness.

“Will you come to my room this afternoon about five, Miss Harper?” Doris requested on the day before that of a complete rehearsal of the play. In the act of leaving the dining room after luncheon Doris paused for an instant behind Leila’s chair.

“With pleasure. I may be a little late, but I won’t fail to come,” Leila assured. Supposing Doris’s request had something to do with the approaching rehearsal, Leila thought nothing further about it. It was twenty minutes past five that afternoon when she knocked on the door of Doris’s room. It was the first time she had been asked to enter it by Doris. Muriel never entertained her chums there, “for fear of freezing them,” she always said.

“There’s something I must ask you, Miss Harper,” Doris opened the conversation with an anxious little rush. She went on to lay the case of Julia’s spite against Leslie before Leila. “I am sorry to have to mention Miss Cairns’s name even to you. There seemed only this one way. I know I can trust you. I know you can suggest something.”

Leila listened with laughter in her blue eyes. She had already been agitating her resourceful brain on the matter of Julia’s garrulity. The plan she had dimly formed on the day when she and Marjorie had driven to Orchard Inn had developed better even than she had expected.

“I think I have a way of managing her,” she said with a flashing smile of confidence.

“She is not easy to manage,” warned Doris. “It will take something unusual to make an impression on her. She is envious and jealous and that blinds her to see much good in any one.”

“I will see her when I leave you. I have seen Miss Cairns, Miss Monroe. Miss Dean and I met her on the way from Orchard Inn several days ago. She spoke to Miss Dean in my presence of the Romp. She is your friend, I believe, and is anxious that you shall not be blamed for anything. That is really all I wish to say in the matter.” Leila gave Doris a straight, significant glance.

Doris settled back limply in her chair, “I – I – am surprised,” she stammered. “I wish you – no, I don’t, either. I’ll ask Leslie. She will tell me what it’s all about. I like Leslie, Miss Harper.”

“I like her myself better than I used to,” was Leila’s careful answer.

“Have you – ”

Doris did not finish. The door was flung open and a breezy, delighted shout of “Leila Greatheart!” ascended as Muriel Harding rushed upon Leila and hugged her. “Welcome to our cubicle! Why didn’t you tell me you were coming to see me?”

“I cannot tell a lie. I didn’t come here to see you at all, at all. I came to see Miss Monroe. Now I must be going. You may both come to see Midget and me this evening.”

“Oh, I can’t – that is – not this evening,” Doris protested weakly. She dearly wished to accept the invitation.

“She means she won’t come if I do,” Muriel cheerfully supplied. Muriel’s tone did not accord with her feelings. She was actually hurt, but gamely refused to show it.

“I meant nothing of the sort,” Doris contradicted. Instantly she reflected that she had meant precisely that. “I beg your pardon,” she addressed Muriel stiffly. “I did mean that. I don’t now. I will come this evening, Miss Harper.”

“Good night! I shall expect you both.” Leila flashed out of the door, hurriedly closing it after her. Left to themselves the two girls might effect an understanding. She knew that Muriel was still vague as to why Doris had suddenly turned against her.

“Suppose we have it out this time, just to see how wrathful we can be,” Muriel proposed, a shade of satire in the proposal. “That’s the only way I know to break up a situation that’s been hard on both of us. I’ve always thought the wires were crossed somewhere in Harding’s and Monroe’s last fight, but I couldn’t prove it. Harding’s and Monroe’s last fight! Doesn’t that sound thrilling? It makes one think of Indians, cowboys, rattlesnakes, buffaloes, prairies and – geese,” she ended with a laugh.

“I hope it will be Harding’s and Monroe’s last fight,” Doris said with sudden energy. “I know now that a certain other person was to blame for most of it. I know that you were not trying to be kind to me or belittle me. I’m not so sure about Miss Dean.”

“She loves you, Doris Monroe.” Muriel sprang into affectionate defense of Marjorie. “You never had a more faithful crush. She is the one who started the name of the fairy-tale princess for you. She has adored your beauty and wanted you to be in theatricals so that you could be seen and admired. She was the judge who delivered the adjuration to Beauty at the beauty contest. She is the best friend you have on the – ”

Muriel stopped at sound of an odd little murmur from Doris. The fairy-tale princess had dropped into a chair with her golden head pillowed on one arm. Muriel’s torrent of loving defense had fallen upon Doris like verbal hailstones. In fending for Marjorie she had forgotten her own side of the estrangement.

While the two were deep in amiable and verbose adjustment of their disagreement Leila was calling upon Julia Peyton. As she afterward confided to Vera: “I was there, Midget, with my tongue in my cheek.”

Her interview with moon-eyed Julia appeared to be eminently satisfactory. She soon left the garrulous sophomore’s room, followed by Julia to the door. Leila managed to walk down the hall to her own room after the interview with an air of dignity becoming to a post graduate. She was well aware that Julia stood in the doorway of her room watching her. When she was safely within the walls of her own domicile she astonished Vera by making a laughing dive for her couch bed. She flung herself upon it and gave way to merriment.

“You should have been with me, Midget,” she gasped. “I have had a lively time with the Screech Owl and the Phonograph. I have written a part for Miss Peyton in my new Irish play of ‘Desmond O’Dowd.’ It is that of Derina, the village gossip. She has not read it yet. When she does, I may have the part but no Screech Owl to play it. If you wish to tie your enemy’s hands, offer him an honor. I have written the part of Derina especially to show this soph what she is. By the time she has rehearsed the part several dozen times she will wish to be any body but this one. I shall give her my personal attention. You know what that means. She may need a rehearsal every day. Hard on Leila. But think of the good to humanity!”

“Ingenious, you old star worshipper,” laughed Vera. “Do you know she is, I believe, almost the only gossip on the campus. That’s fine for Hamilton, isn’t it? Every day we are growing better and better. Speaking of goodness reminds me of our own Marjorie. She and Jerry are coming over this evening.”

“And I am expecting company; Matchless Muriel and the Ice Queen. Are they not a fine combination?” Leila cast a sly smile of triumph toward Vera. “How do you like my news, Midget?”

“I’m flabbergasted. Honestly, Leila, have those two patched up their quarrel?” Vera exhibited delighted wonder.

“Honestly, they have. Know, Midget, that I am always honest.” She drew down a disapproving face. “How can you ask me such a question?” Immediately her engaging smile broke forth. “I have certainly a cheering budget of news for Beauty tonight. What with the thawing of the Ice Queen and the taming of the Screech Owl this has been a grander day on the campus than that of the Kerriberry Fair, in County Kerry, ould Ireland.”

CHAPTER XXIV
THE HAPPIEST PERSON

Easter vacation brought Captain Dean to Hamilton Arms and tumultuous happiness to Marjorie’s heart. Greatly as she had come to love the Arms for its stately marvelous beauty and comfort, the loving devotion of Miss Susanna and the fact that it had been the home of Brooke Hamilton, she now loved it more strongly because it was graced by her adored captain’s presence.

Since the morning when she had read the journal of Brooke Hamilton she had not written another word of his biography. “I can’t write,” she plaintively complained to Miss Susanna. “Spring and Captain and Brooke Hamilton’s journal have all got into my brain and won’t be shoved back. I’ll have to get all over the strenuousness of them before I can go on writing.”

“I think I shall lock up the study for a while, anyway,” Miss Susanna threatened. “The Army owes a duty to its superior officer. I shall order Lieutenant Dean out on guide duty to Captain Dean. Ensign Hamilton and Corporal Macy will go along for company.”

“Corporal Macy.” Jerry elevated her nose in deep disgust. “I’m a lieutenant myself. Kindly remember it. An ensign doesn’t belong to the Army. An ensign belongs properly to the Navy.”

“I shall be the great exception,” persisted Miss Susanna, laughing. “Ensign sounds well with ‘Hamilton.’ It is not seemly for youth to scornfully contradict age.”

“First show me age,” retorted Jerry. “There ain’t no such animal around here.”

“I’m going to take Captain for a walk around the estate this morning,” Marjorie announced. “There are oceans of things I want to show her and talk about. Almost every bush or tree at the Arms has an interesting history, all its own. Ensign Hamilton and, ahem, Corporal Macy are cordially invited to join the walk around.”

“Lieutenant Macy doesn’t regret that she has an engagement with Major Jonas Kent to plant dahlias this morning. Major Kent is far more polite than certain other officers of the detachment of far lesser rank,” Jerry declined with significance.

“I ought to be, and I am, the happiest person in the world, I believe.” Marjorie later voiced this fervent opinion as she sat on a rustic bench between her Captain and Miss Hamilton.

The three had seated themselves in the sweet spring sunlight at indolent ease after a long ramble about the magnificently kept grounds of the Arms. Under their feet the young green grass wove a soft living carpet. Over their heads spread the iron-strong branches of a mammoth tulip tree.

“Just because I am so happy, every once in a while I think of Mr. Brooke, Miss Susanna. Then I grow sad for a little. How beautiful it would have been for Angela and him to live here year after year in the perfect happiness of love! I often wonder how he had the courage to go through so many weary years after she left him. He chose such a patient, brave-hearted way.”

“Perhaps he accomplished more of good because of such a sorrow than he might have wrought without it,” sighed Miss Hamilton. “From the time of Angela’s death he centered himself more than ever on the founding of Hamilton College. It might well be called a monument to the two women he loved. The nobility of plan and execution were inspired by his mother. But the beauty of nature which he cultivated and carried out with such rare taste and sentiment on the campus is his tribute to Angela. Day after day, early and late, he busied himself with enhancing the beauty of that overgrown grass plot. Perhaps his spirit communed with hers as he worked. This was before my time. You will find a packet of what he named, ‘My garden letters,’ among the data. If you haven’t already been over it, you have a joy in store for you.”

Miss Susanna stared absently out over the sea of living green splashed with the pale pinks, yellows and scarlets of early blooming shrubs. Mrs. Dean had taken no part in the conversation, preferring to listen. Marjorie’s wistful observation regarding Brooke Hamilton and Angela Vernon had raised a feeling of surprise in her mind. It was the most sentimental word she had ever heard Marjorie utter.

Since her arrival at the Arms she had been permitted by Miss Hamilton to read the journal over which she had heard the Lady of the Arms and her lieutenant have several long discussions. Jerry had also been permitted to read it. She had at first cried over it, then impatiently characterized stately Brooke Hamilton as a “lovable old stupid” for not “getting it across” first thing that Angela was in love with him.

“I have a perfectly celostrous idea, children.” Marjorie thus gaily designated the two beside her. “It came out of what you just said of Mr. Brooke and the campus.” She lightly clasped Miss Susanna’s arm. “I’ll put Mr. Brooke’s love idyl in ‘Realization,’ together with his nature work on the campus. That will do away with having to write of how he made Angela unhappy for so many years because he didn’t know he loved her. I will state only that they met first when very young, and without knowing their own hearts. I think I will keep the entry about her riding down to the station with the picture to say good-bye to him.” Marjorie turned to Miss Susanna, her eyes questioning.

“You are to do as you please, Marvelous Manager.” Miss Susanna smiled into the beautiful, colorful face so near her own. “If you wished to publish the journal verbatim, I’d not gainsay you.”

“I know you wouldn’t, Goldendede.” Marjorie returned the smile with interest. “I don’t wish him to be misunderstood. He was not intentionally selfish. He was simply wrapped in his own great dream. The world, were it to read that journal, might call him hard-hearted. Even he reproached himself after he found that he loved Angela. I will leave out anything that I should not care to say of him myself. I pledged friendship with him in the beginning, you remember.”

“I am glad you feel as I do about his love affair.” Miss Susanna said with a grateful little nod. “I have always thought mention of it, at least, important in a biography of him. I was not sure what to do. I had thought, at the time when I talked with President Burns of having it prepared for publication, of submitting only a brief paragraph or two about Angela Vernon. I leave the matter contentedly to you.”

“That’s enough to bring back my lost inspiration,” was the blithe declaration. “Come on, both of you.” Marjorie sprang to her feet. She stretched an inviting hand to both her mother and Miss Susanna. “I shall proceed to hustle you about the rest of the grounds before luncheon. I’m going to the study to work this afternoon. Don’t dare lock it up.” She laid energetic command upon Miss Hamilton.

“What’s to become of my sight-seeing tour?” doughtily demanded Miss Susanna.

“Corporal Macy will conduct it. Order her to it, and promise her a commission of major,” Marjorie merrily proposed.

“Yes, genius is really beginning to burn again,” Miss Susanna teasingly commented. “Jerry shall earn her commission.” As she spoke she had allowed Marjorie to pull her to her feet.

“Let’s walk down by the gate,” Marjorie proposed. “I wish Captain to see that wonderful Chinese white lilac bush that once grew in the royal Chinese gardens.”

They were not more than halfway across the space of lawn intervening between the rustic seat and the white, feathery plumed lilac bush when the eyes of all three picked up the trim lines of a small black roadster which had stopped at the entrance gates. There were two persons in the roadster. One of them, a tall, broad-shouldered man in gray tweeds and motor hat to match, was already out of the car. He had turned to give an assisting hand to a young woman who vaguely resembled him. She smiled happily at him as she stepped lightly to the ground. The two turned their backs on the car and approached the gates.

“It’s Leslie Cairns!” Marjorie said in a low, astounded tone.

“It’s – Can it be?” Miss Susanna shaded her eyes from the sun with a small, sturdy hand. “I believe it is – Peter Carden!”

CHAPTER XXV
UNDER THE TULIP TREE

“Well, Peter, the years have dealt lightly with you,” was Miss Susanna’s greeting as she held out a hand to Alec Carden’s runaway son.

She had heard from Marjorie of the recent agreeable change in Leslie Cairns. Marjorie had felt it only fair to Leslie to acquaint Miss Susanna with that change. The old lady now divined that Peter Carden had come to the Arms on a friendly errand. Her quick brain had instantly arrived at the truth as she glanced from Leslie to Peter Carden. Leslie was his daughter. Followed immediately the recollection of the financier’s altered name.

“So you changed your name to Cairns, and this is your daughter,” she continued with abruptness. In her astonishment she momentarily forgot to make introductions.

“Yes.” Peter Cairns showed admiration of the intrepid little woman who had successfully fought off his bullying father and a college board largely composed of rascals. His keen eyes registered an expression of deference which he seldom accorded either men or women. “This is my daughter, Leslie, Miss Susanna.” He drew Leslie gently forward. “She came to meet you and to see Miss Dean. I came to see you.”

“I’m glad you have. I might not have said that years ago, but I can say it now.” Miss Susanna introduced Peter Cairns and Leslie to Mrs. Dean, and the financier to Marjorie. The latter and Leslie had already exchanged friendly salutations.

Marjorie thought she had never before seen Leslie look so well. Beauty, even prettiness of the regulation type she would never have. There was a new expression of light and animation on her face, however, which made her what her father had often called her as a child: “his ugly beauty.” The loose, unprepossessing droop to her mouth which Marjorie had formerly most disliked in her features was gone. A half humorous little quirk had taken the place of the ugly droop. It brightened her face wonderfully. Always of extremely symmetrical figure she was at her best today in a pale blue broadcloth dress. The softening grace of a wide summer fur draped her shoulders. Every detail of her apparently simple toilet had been carefully chosen. Leslie was a model of smart attiring.

“I don’t feel much older than when I was Peter Harum-scarum, as John used to call me,” smiled the financier. “I have had many a good and many a bad time at the Hedge. It has been mine for two years. I bought it from John. I am glad old Alec died. A hard thing to say of one’s own father, perhaps. He had a hard hand, and a hard nature. I was glad to hear that you fought things to a finish with him.”

“You may say what you please to me about Alec Carden, Peter. I know it will be the truth. I dislike to hear a man who was detested by his children while he lived hypocritically mourned by them after Providence has mercifully removed him from their midst,” Miss Hamilton declared with candid relish. “Come up to the house and have luncheon with us. I hear you are a king of finance. Your history after you ran away from home must be interesting. You weren’t more than twenty-four when you went, were you?”

“Twenty-five.” Peter Cairns laughed, a short bitter sound. “Thank you for the invitation, Miss Hamilton. Some other day we’ll accept with pleasure. We have a business engagement today with a man named Peter Graham.” He and Leslie looked at each other and laughed.

Her glance toward him was a vivid brightening of feature which Marjorie thought beautiful. “Won’t you come over and sit down under the big tulip tree?” she invited winningly. “We have been sitting there in the sunshine loving the spring outdoors.”

“Yes, do. Peter, go and bring that seat over here under the tulip tree with the other,” directed Miss Susanna pointing out a nearby rustic seat.

“Yes’m.” The usually silent, taciturn man, who kept his large office force in a state of continual awe, ran like a boy to bring up the rustic bench and place it under the tulip tree opposite the other.

“Now, Peter, what in the world prompted you to come to see me?” the old lady inquired briskly, as she re-seated herself on the bench. Mrs. Dean courteously excused herself and walked on to the house. She decided that the four she had left would get along better without her. Miss Susanna and Leslie sat on one seat. Marjorie and Peter Cairns on the other.

“Oh, a number of things,” Peter Cairns replied with an odd little duck of the head which Miss Susanna recalled him as a boy.

“You two,” she indicated father and daughter, “are full of pleasant mystery. Your faces give you away.”

“It is pleasant mystery; very pleasant,” he replied with friendly conviction. “This is what it’s all about.” In his short-cut fashion he quickly outlined what he had already informed Leslie regarding the ownership of the site she had chosen on which to build the garage.

“I took the property away from Leslie because I was not pleased with her,” he continued frankly. “Saxe refunded the money. He was entirely innocent in the matter. I took the sixty thousand dollars refund and invested it for Leslie. It was her money. She had paid far too much for the site. As the site belonged to the Carden estate and the Carden estate belonged to me I took over the whole garage enterprise. Leslie had to bear the loss of the money she had used for construction and other foolish purposes. I wanted to show her what a flivver she’d made.

“We agreed to tell this tale together. I’ve told my part of it. Now Leslie will tell hers. Your turn, Cairns II,” he raised his heavy brows meaningly at Leslie.

“My father told me if I could think up a good reason for having my garage site back again, he would give it to me. The requirements were that whatever I wanted it for must benefit Hamilton College and all connected with it. He said it must be an original reason.” Leslie came to the point with the same celerity as was Peter Cairns’s habit.

“I tried at first to think of something that would work out with your plans, Miss Dean,” she now addressed Marjorie. “I knew you had long since provided against emergency. Every time I thought of the word originality I thought of Leila Harper. I used to think when I was at Hamilton that she was originality.” Leslie smiled briefly. “Miss Monroe raves over her. She says she is a dramatist, stage manager, actor and so forth. This is my idea. I’d like to build a theatre on the garage site. I’d call it the Leila Harper Playhouse. I’d present it to Hamilton College with the proviso that Miss Harper should always control the theatre and the policy of the plays. I would like to will her to Hamilton College as a rare dramatist, actor and manager.” Leslie paused. Once fairly started on her proposal she had grown more and more animated.

“You take my breath!” Marjorie gave a little rapturous gasp. “I should say your plan was original. I think it’s the very heart of gracious generosity. I love Leila, Miss Cairns, and wish more than I can say to have her appreciated and honored at Hamilton.”

“She ought to be appreciated. She is going to be. You see a theatre will be of benefit to all the campus folks. It will be a source of amusement and pleasure to all. The money resulting from the plays should go to help the dormitory along. It will train girls who have histrionic ability for the stage. It will encourage students to play-writing. There will be prizes offered, so many each year for the best in plays, perhaps for exceptionally fine acting. My father will endow it. I shall put a part of my money into the endowment provided my idea is accepted by the Travelers. My name is not to be mentioned in it. My father doesn’t wish his to be, either.”

“None of the Travelers could or would refuse such an offer, Miss Cairns. Remember it is first of all for Leila. She has worked so hard to give the campus good plays. Not to mention all the splendid things she’s done for Hamilton as a Traveler.” Marjorie sang Leila’s praises with a high heart. “Yet none of us would wish yours or your father’s name to be withheld. It would be our grateful pleasure to tell others of your splendid gift.”

“You make it seem the thing for us to do – I don’t know. Let me come again and talk with you about it. My father and I are partners now,” she threw him a fond comradely glance. He and Miss Susanna had listened and let youth talk out its own matters of interest.

It was an hour later when Peter Cairns and Leslie left the Arms, happy in the long step that had been taken that day toward the partnership of which they had talked and dreamed in bygone years in New York.

“Miss Susanna has changed more than any other person I ever knew,” were the financier’s first words to Leslie as they drove away from Hamilton Arms. “She was a sweet woman until after she had so much trouble with my father and that rascally board. I was only a little boy then. I never saw her again after I left Carden Hedge until a few years ago when I came up here to see John. She looked like a fierce, sullen little creature of the wild, ready to snarl at a word. Now she is charming. She looks as though she had found what we have – happiness.”

“Blame it on Bean,” Leslie said with a shadow of her old satiric smile. “She can change anything. She even put over the great transformation on me.”

Back at the Arms Jerry, who had successfully put dozens of plump dahlia tubers into the soft brown earth under Jonas’s somewhat critical eye, was now racing across the lawn to the tulip tree.

“I saw the company from afar. Who were they?” she called out when within a few feet of the rustic benches where Miss Susanna and Marjorie had reseated themselves. “No one I ever saw before. I couldn’t label either one of them.”

“You have seen them both before, Jeremiah,” Marjorie calmly assured. “The young lady was Leslie Cairns. The man was – our gasoline bogie.”

“What-t? Has one hob-goblin wed another. Don’t tell me the grand Hob-goblin is married!” Jerry looked ridiculous consternation.

“Who said anything about being married. The gasoline bogie is Leslie Cairns’s father.”

“Then he must be a house robber. What was he doing around the Carden estate at that hour of the night?” Jerry demanded.

“He is not a house robber.” Marjorie was now laughing. “He is a house owner. He owns Carden Hedge, and his name is Peter Carden. He is the Carden son who ran away from home and changed his name to Peter Cairns.

“Good night.” Her eyes on Marjorie, Jerry went to sit down on the end of one of the two benches. She missed the bench and sat down forcefully on the soft grass.

“Can you beat it?” she giggled as she scrambled to her feet and dropped down beside Marjorie, this time in the middle of the bench. “Can you blame me for that flivver? I’ve heard of being overcome by astonishment. It just happened to Jeremiah.”