CHAPTER IX.DEFEATING HER OWN HAPPINESS
When the door had closed on her gossiping caller Doris sat down again at the table. She leaned her beautiful head on her white, dimpled arms and gave herself up to brief disconsolate reverie. Now that she was alone she wondered whether what Julia Peyton had said about Muriel Harding was strictly true. There was one way in which she could find out with certainty. She would ask Muriel point-blank if it were true that four off-campus girls had refused her invitation. She would ask Muriel, also, where she had gained so much information regarding herself. When she endeavored to recall Julia’s exact words she found they did not mean much. Julia’s reluctant inflections, her stammering pauses, had implied so much more than words.
Julia’s object in warning Doris against Muriel had been double. Since the evening when she had made complaint against the noise in Room 15 she had shown marked hostility to the knot of post graduatesat Wayland Hall. She and Clara Carter had encouraged Doris in her half fancied dislike for them. She had noted the new spirit of friendliness growing between Doris and Muriel with every intention of crushing it if she could. She kept up a zealous watching and longing for an opportunity to create dissention between them. She had a habit of dropping in on Doris in her room when Muriel was there purposely to see how things were between the two. She never spoke to Muriel, however.
About the time she had begun to despair of making mischief between them she was delighted to overhear a group of chattering freshmen in the gymnasium one afternoon gaily discussing their Christmas plans. What most pleased her were the remarks of one of them: “Isn’t it too bad? Miss Harding can’t find a single dorm to trot home with her. They are all attached. It’s too bad for her. I mean. Of course it’s lovely for the dorms.”
The jealous, prejudiced girl had chosen to place an entirely different construction upon the remarks from that intended by the merry little freshman. By the time she had repeated the remarks to Clara Carter, her roommate, with embellishments, they hadassumed an ugly tone. Clara also contributed a few opinions which did not improve matters.
Added to this it needed but the rumor that Doris Monroe was going home with Miss Harding for the holidays to set the mischief-making pair of sophomores to work. Julia was of the opinion that since Doris had planned to go home with Muriel she and Miss Cairns must have quarreled. If she could only set Doris against her roommate then Doris would go home for the vacation with her. She would have the pleasure of boasting that she had entertained the college beauty. She was confident that she would gain socially by having entertained Doris as her guest. With so much to be gained to her interest Julia had picked her hour and boldly braved the “Busy” sign and Doris’s “royal” manner. At the last she had not dared propose to Doris that her wrathful classmate should spend the vacation with her. She returned to her room to inform Clara, who was watching for her, that she had just missed getting into an awful mess.
With a pettish little jerk of her head Doris straightened in her chair. She picked up the letter she had been writing from the table and began reading it over. Then she sat staring reflectively at it, as though deliberating some very special course.Next instant and she had torn the unfinished letter in pieces. With the peculiar cresting of her golden head, always a sign of defiance, she reached for her fountain pen where it had rolled to one end of the table.
“Dear Leslie:” she wrote, her green eyes darkening with her unquiet thoughts. “If you really meant what you said when I left you the other day at the Colonial, then I will take you at your word. Miss Harding, my roommate, has invited me to go home with her. I prefer to go to New York with you, provided you will not feel that I am an incumbrance to your plans. Let me know immediately what you wish to do.
“Sincerely,“Doris Monroe.”
“Sincerely,“Doris Monroe.”
“Sincerely,“Doris Monroe.”
“Sincerely,
“Doris Monroe.”
She read the brief note, folded it and prepared it for mailing. Then she tucked the envelope in her portfolio, but without a stamp. She glanced up at the clock. It was nearing six. Muriel would soon arrive. Of late she and Muriel had exchanged the cheerful, careless greetings of girlhood when they met in their room or on the campus. She had lately begun to find a roommate might be a congenial comfortinstead of a tiresome inconvenience. Now it was all spoiled. Muriel had pretended pity for her to other students. Of all things detested, Doris most disliked being pitied.
In spite of her anger against Muriel, Doris could do no less than admit to herself that Julia Peyton’s word was not to be taken above Muriel’s. Yet she was sullenly convinced that Muriel must have said something pitying about her to someone. How else could Julia have heard it? A bright flush dyed her face as she thought of herself as being a last-resort guest. Perhaps Muriel had been asked by Miss Dean to invite her, merely as a welfare experiment. She had heard that Miss Dean was fond of making such experiments. It was outrageous thatsheshould have been selected as the victim of one. Other far-fetched, flashing conjectures visited her troubled brain as she waited for Muriel’s coming. She could not decide whether to treat Muriel with friendliness, asking her frankly for an explanation, or to resort once again to her old-time haughty indifference.
Muriel’s sudden breezy entrance and accompanying cry: “Where, oh, where, are the lickerish lights?” took Doris’s mind off herself for a moment. Muriel had already pressed the switch near the door. Shemade such an attractive study in her gray squirrel coat and cap, cheeks carnation pink, dark eyes snapping with sheer love of life Doris had no desire to be haughty.
“I forgot the lights,” she said with a little shrug. She continued to watch Muriel who was removing coat and cap. “I should like to ask you something,” she said as Muriel hung up her wraps and commenced smoothing her ruffled hair before a mirror.
“Ask ahead.” Muriel waved affable permission with her hair brush.
“Is there—are there—am I the only guest you have invited for Christmas?” Unconsciously Doris’s voice had taken on a shade of its former icy quality.
“You’re the only one who’s coming,” laughed Muriel. “You’re by no means the only one I invited.”
“Oh!” Doris gave a queer little gasp.
“Did you hear about my dormitory girls? I invited them, and they accepted. Then they had unexpected checks sent them from home and away they went. I wandered around looking for some checkless, invitationless dorms. There were no such stoojents.” Muriel declared good-humoredly. “I supposed of course you were dated ahead for the holidays. Then I asked you, and found you weren’t. I was so glad.I’d have felt sorry to think of you poking around the campus over Christmas alone. You’re so far from home, you see. Marjorie said the same and—”
“I don’t wish anyone to be sorry for me.” Doris’s almost fierce utterance checked Muriel’s flow of cheery volubility.
“All right. I’m not sorry a bit. You only dreamed I was,” she retorted in a tone of gay raillery.
“I’m not jesting. I am serious.” Doris drew herself up, a slim figure of affronted dignity. All that Julia had said of Muriel was true. Only one question, and Muriel had then practically admitted saying almost the exact words Julia had quoted as hers.
“Oh-h-h?” Muriel voiced the monosyllable questioningly. Her bright expression faded into concern. “Serious about what?” she asked.
“About not wishing you or Miss Dean or any of your friends to be sorry for me. I have plenty of friends—delightful friends. Why, I’ve refused half a dozen Christmas invitations! I have changed my mind about going home with you. I’m not going. I shall go to New York instead. I might have liked you, if you hadn’t tried to pity me behind my back. That was worse than to my face. Please tell MissDean to mind her own affairs. I am not a welfare experiment.”
Doris delivered the long answer to Muriel’s question in a voice that grew more scornful with each word. She busied herself as she sputtered forth her displeasure with the donning of hat and coat. With “experiment” she snatched the letter she had written to Leslie Cairns from the portfolio, hastily affixed a stamp to the envelope and rushed from the room. Muriel watched her go, divided between vexation and perplexity. What under the sun had happened to the Ice Queen?
CHAPTER X.THE COMING OF ST. NICK
“You know, if you are good, Santa Claus will surely visit you on Christmas eve,” Marjorie was gravely saying to the bright-faced, alert little old lady ensconced in a big cushiony chair before the cheerful open fireplace. Marjorie emphasized her injunction with gentle little shakes of a forefinger.
“How good do I have to be? Will Santa Claus come down the chimney?” anxiously questioned Miss Susanna in a high treble that evoked a burst of merriment from the rest of the little group gathered about the fire. “Miss Susanna’s bodyguard,” Vera had lightly named Leila, Robin, Marjorie and herself.
“How good do you think you can be?” Marjorie paused to allow her question to take effect.
“That will depend upon the reward of goodness,” chuckled the old lady.
“You are altogether too precautious.” Marjoriesimulated disapproval. “But you can’t fool Santa. He will know the minute he sees you just what sort of little girl you are.”
Miss Susanna peeped through her fingers at Marjorie in a funny, abashed, child-like fashion that elicited fresh laughter. “You can’t fool me, either. He nevercouldcome down the chimney and out of that fireplace. I’m going to tell him what you said, when I see him. Then maybe he won’t like you,” she predicted in juvenile triumph.
“Oh, I didn’t say he’d come downourchimney,” reprovingly corrected Marjorie. “I only said hemightvisit you. He alwaysusedto come in at that window over there.” She pointed to one of the living room east windows which opened upon a side veranda.
Miss Susanna appeared impressed at last. “Yes; he could get in here that way. I guess I’d better be good.” A little shout greeted her reluctant admission. “Such a day as I’ve had, children.” She gave a sigh of perfect happiness. “I’m certainly beginning to make up for some of the customs and rites of old Christmas I have missed.”
The jolly Christmas company from Hamilton College had arrived in Sanford in the evening of the previous day. They had separated briefly at thestation to go to their various destinations blithely promising Marjorie to be on hand by ten o’clock the next morning to go to a neighboring woods on a winter picnic. The express object of the picnic was the securing and bringing home of the Christmas tree to Castle Dean.
The hard labor part of the expedition had fallen to General Dean. He had complained of the detail in a loud, ungeneral-like manner as a “one-man, wood-chopping stunt,” and had immediately engaged the services of Hal Macy, Charlie Stevens and Danny Seabrooke. The wages they demanded were: “Lots of good eats, and a chance to hang around with the crowd.” The wily general affably agreed to their demand without consulting either the commissary or entertainment departments.
It had proved a memorably merry day. The fun began when the rollicking, cheering forest expedition had piled onto the two long bob sleds, each drawn by four big, satin-coated field horses. It had continued until the young foresters had come singing home through the dusk, the sleds laden with fragrant balsam trees and boughs.
Bred to thrive in the great outdoors the sturdy mistress of Hamilton Arms had enjoyed the winter picnic no less than her youthful companions. Whilethere had been sufficient snow to permit the use of the bob sleds, it was of the frost-like crystallized kind. The sun had peered curiously forth from his winter quarters, had apparently approved the gay winter cavalcade. He had flashed in and out of fleecy clouds at them on their way to the woods. Later, when they had hilariously disposed themselves on the bob sleds for an al fresco luncheon he had come out in all his glory to shine on them.
What most amused the girls was the crush which Miss Susanna and Hal immediately developed for each other. Miss Hamilton and Hal had met at the June Commencement of Hamilton College of the previous summer. Devotion to Marjorie had formed an instant, though unspoken bond between them. Hal had somehow gained the comforting impression that Miss Susanna approved of him for Marjorie. The shrewd old lady had not miscalculated his worth. She had been too wise, however even to mention him to Marjorie. Nor had Marjorie ever mentioned Hal to her save as an old friend, or as Jerry’s brother.
The wise old Lady of the Arms had seen too much of heartache, misunderstanding and vain regret not to appreciate the wonder of the love which Hal held for Marjorie. Miss Susanna had had her ownromance. It had ended summarily in her girlhood when she found the man she had loved unworthy. In true love itself she still believed, though she skeptically rated it as so rare as to be almost extinct. Then had come Hal, with his clean-cut good looks and wistful blue eyes. She could only receive him into her interested regard with the hope Marjorie might one day “wake up to love.”
Friends of Marjorie Dean knew the quartette of stories relative to her doings at Sanford High School. They form the “Marjorie Dean High School Series.” These friends have also followed her through her four years at Hamilton College by medium of the “Marjorie Dean College Series.” Her subsequent return to Hamilton campus as a post graduate has been set down in the first two volumes of the “Post Graduate Series,” entitled respectively: “Marjorie Dean, College Post Graduate,” and “Marjorie Dean, Marvelous Manager.”
“It has been a good day; now let it be—good night,” declaimed Leila with a dramatic gesture.
“Good night,” Vera sweetly responded. “So sorry you are going.” She smiled honeyed dismissal of Leila.
“But I am not going. Now why should you think I was? I see little sadness in your round face, Midget,” was the satiric retort.
“You said ‘good night.’ Of course, if you didn’t know what you were saying—” Vera shrugged eloquently.
“Can you not allow your Celtic friend to quote from that most celebrated of all playwrights, Leila Harper?” demanded Leila, with an air of deep injury. “Is not that the hero’s parting speech from my latest and best house play? I can prove it by Robin. Did I not nearly ruin my fine Irish voice drilling the hero to say it with expression?”
In process of delivering this scathing rebuke to Midget Leila bent down and swept Ruffle, Marjorie’s stately Angora cat, into her arms. “It is you and I who will now have a talk about Santa Claus,” she genially informed the struggling, fluffy-haired captive.
“N-n-u-u-u!” objected Ruffle in a deep displeased tone.
“So you can say ‘no.’ Well, it is ‘yes’ you should say. Let me tell you it is not about Santa Claus, but about Ruffle Claws we should be talking. You have a fine sharp assortment.” Ruffle had threateningly spread his claws but had refrained from usingthem. “You are more gentle than I should be if some tall, wide person had the boldness to swing me up off my feet.” Leila willingly released the big, handsome gray and white puss.
Ruffle immediately sidled over to Miss Susanna, waving his plumy tail. He began a slow walk around her chair, keeping his luminous gray-green eyes fastened persistently upon her. Presently deciding that his mute plea was in vain he hopped up into her lap and settled himself upon it.
“Here comes General. Look out, Miss Susanna. He is more dangerous than Ruffle. He would as soon tip you out of that chair as not.” Marjorie sent out this timely warning.
“Oh, I heard you.” Mr. Dean had stepped briefly into the living room on his way to the street. “I can’t stop to assert myself. Tomorrow I’ll spend a Merry Christmas dumping usurpers out of my chair. Anyone found sitting in it will be eligible to dumping. All persons thus dumped must pick themselves up without the slightest assistance from me.”
“Your hear that, Ruffle?” Robin Page laughingly reached forward and gently tweaked one of Ruffle’s white whiskers.
“Tomorrow never comes,” Marjorie said teasingly. “But, here’s an unofficial order for you,General Dean;” she pointed a forceful finger at her father. “Pick up your detachment as soon as you can and hike for—you know where,” she added with mischievous lights dancing in her brown eyes.
“Yes, Lieutenant,” Mr. Dean saluted. “Never give your superior officer orders. Under the circumstances, however, I will overlook your lack of proper military respect.”
“Thank you, General.” Marjorie saluted with a great show of respect. Her parting injunction to her superior officer, delivered in the next breath was deplorably lacking in that particular military requisite. “You’d better overlook it and obey my order,” she called after him as he left the room, laughing.
“Something is going on here besides a possible visit from Saint Nick,” asserted Vera positively. “The air of mystery in this barrack has been growing ever since dinner. Why did Captain disappear so suddenly, right after dinner, without a word to anyone? And Delia went with her. They slid out the front door in such a rush!”
“It’s Christmas Eve, you know.” Marjorie made this trite explanation with great cheerfulness. “All sorts of remarkable things are likely to happen on Christmas Eve.”
“Then the rest of the crowd must have been lostin this mysterious atmosphere,” commented Leila with naive conviction. “It is eight o’clock, and not one of them here. I have my suspicions of you, Beauty. You are too full of mystery to be reliable. Who knows what dark Christmas contraption you have framed for the poor Lady of the Arms and three more of us?”
“Who knows but I?” Marjorie tantalized. “Oh, well; it wasn’t so very long ago that I walked into a campus contraption all of you had set for me. Please don’t forget to remember that.”
The prolonged peal of the door bell sent her running on light feet to the door. A sound of soft voices and smothered giggles in the hall, then she and Muriel Harding entered the living room.
“What is it you know that you think so funny?” Leila began on Muriel. “I always supposed I knew more than you. It seems I do not.”
“Of course you don’t,” Muriel was quick to assure. “You now see what conceited delusions you’ve cherished. For further delusions consult the stars.”
“I should be ashamed to consult them about such foolishness.” Leila’s smiling urbanity matched Muriel’s own bland assurance. “They might choose to rate me as a dummy.”
“Both doors into the drawing room are locked.” Robin Page now added to the case against Lieutenant Dean. “I was going to charm you with an after-dinner Christmas carol and, bing! Robin was locked out.”
Muriel and Marjorie treated Robin’s plaintive announcement as a huge joke. They locked arms, sat down on the davenport exactly together with a frisky jounce and shed beaming effulgence on their companions.
“There has been a villain’s convention somewhere,” growled Leila in the deep rumble she called her “Celtic double-bass.” “Speak, Lady of the Arms. Name the arch villain.” She made a sudden melodramatic lunge toward Miss Susanna, who had been following the exchange of exuberant raillery in enjoying silence.
“Sh-h-h-h.” Miss Susanna raised a small, cautioning hand. “I’m trying to be good. Don’t break the spell.”
Simultaneous with her warning came a new sound. It proceeded from the very window Marjorie had pointed out to Miss Susanna as a possible entrance for Santa Claus. The window was slowly rising, shoved upward by a pair of energetic arms. Came a flash of shiny black, cherry red and snowy white.Into the room bounced Santa Claus, resplendent in high black boots and long-coated scarlet suit. His rosy face was framed in the venerable whiteness of luxurious cotton locks. His flaming costume was also lavishly trimmed with the same useful cotton.
“Good evening, all,” he piped in a high, cheerful voice. “I have come to find a little girl named Susie Hamilton. I am going to take her and her little playmates to the North Pole with me to spend Christmas Eve.”
CHAPTER XI.OFF TO THE NORTH POLE
The amazed hush that followed Santa Claus’s hospitable declaration was lifted by a gleeful chuckle from Miss Susanna. With the appearance into the room of the fabled Kris Kringle she had hastily set Ruffle from her lap to the floor and risen to her feet. Ruffle placidly took advantage of the situation to gain the coveted chair.
Leila and Vera were hardly less diverted over the sight of Santa Claus than was the last of the Hamiltons. Neither of them knew home as Marjorie, Robin, Muriel and their intimates knew its fond meaning. Leila’s Celtic love of the mystic, fanciful and fictional, had been shared by Vera during their years of comradeship at Hamilton College.
“I’m that little girl. I’m Susie Hamilton.” Miss Susanna walked slowly toward Santa Claus with a droll assumption of shyness.
“You don’t say so? How are you, Susie?” Santa gave the supposed little girl a gripping handshake.“I heard you had been very good. I hope these other little girls have.” He turned very blue, very suspicious eyes upon Muriel, who merely beamed at him familiarly and inquired: “Where’s your friend?”
“I see trouble ahead for one of these infants,” remarked a voice from Santa’s beard that sounded strangely like that of Jerry Macy. Immediately recovering his high-pitched voice Santa announced: “My friend, the King of the North Pole is outside. As my reindeer are all very busy tonight he is going to give me a lift.”
The King of the North Pole evidently yearned for an introduction. A head covered with a peaked, close-fitting hood of glistening, glittering white, followed by a pair of broad shoulders, draped in the same glittering, frost-like material, appeared in the window frame. The reigning monarch of the North Pole, after a brief struggle in passage with a voluminous white cape, landed triumphantly among the admiring company.
A conspicuous bulge in the right side of his glittering cape disappeared as he drew forth a fluffy white worsted coat and held it open for Miss Susanna to slip on. Next moment he had picked her up, carried her across the room, swung her through thewindow and to her feet on the porch floor. Gathering his cape closely about him, he launched through the open frame after her. Again he caught her up, laughing and unresisting, and ran down the walk with her to where a little, old-fashioned cutter, painted bright red and with furry white lap robes awaited her. A large, mild-eyed white horse was harnessed to the cutter, his harness gay with scarlet ribbon rosettes. The King lifted Miss Susanna into the cutter, tucked the furs about her then stood looking laughingly down at her. Nor would he utter a sound. He merely waved a re-assuring hand toward Santa Claus, who had dashed out the front door and was now running down the walk at a kind of wild gallop.
“You’re next,” Santa shrieked over a plump shoulder at the knot of pursuing girls. Reaching the sleigh the juvenile patron saint made a lively leap into it beside Miss Susanna, gathered up the reins, clucked to the horse and whirled away with the Lady of the Arms.
“No time like the present.” The King of the North Pole found his voice. “Either get into my chariot, or be bundled in,” he threatened with smiles. The chariot had been parked behind the sleigh. It greatly resembled Jerry’s limousine.
“I’m not ready to go to the North Pole, your Majesty,” blithely petitioned Marjorie. “I haven’t yet locked up my castle.”
“Delia was at the back door when I came in the window. Want to be bundled in?” The King sent significant glances from the car to Marjorie and back again. He had already gallantly assisted the other girls into the limousine.
“No, indeed.” Marjorie followed her companions into the back of the machine. There they found a collection of Jerry’s wraps placed to meet the emergency. Marjorie smiled to herself as she draped a wide fleecy scarf over her silk-clad shoulders. As the King of the North Pole, Hal had the old, teasing school-boy manner she liked best in him. She hoped he would keep to it throughout her stay in Sanford.
It presently developed that the King of the North Pole had decided to move his icy domain over Christmas to the Macy’s ball room. There it was that Santa also had his headquarters. Miss Susanna was whisked to the top of the Macy’s big house in an elevator and escorted into the ball room, now festally decorated from end to end with fragrant balsam boughs, long trails of sturdy green ground pine and glossy-leaved flaming-berried holly. From the centralelectric chandelier depended a bunch of pearly mistletoe berries.
Santa Claus’s eight reindeer had reached home ahead of their master. Jerry’s four “dorms,” Ronny’s two, Lucy and Kathie, had chosen this detail. Their costumes had been planned for them by Jerry and carried out by Mrs. Dean and Mrs. Macy several days before the arrival at Sanford of the celebrated reindeer themselves. Their brown cotton flannel suits of bloomers and close-fitting knee coats, together with brown hose and sneakers were quite realistic when topped by brown cotton flannel antlered hoods. The antlers were triumphs of pasteboard ingenuity. Their only drawback was their tendency to wabble at times, thereby giving their wearers an appearance of recklessness not attributed to the famous Santa Claus eight. Harnesses strung with little bells completed their costumes.
At the far end of the room in one corner stood an immense Christmas tree, resplendent with its glitter of gilt, silver and gorgeous-hued ornaments. At the foot of the tree was stacked a wealth of festively wrapped, ribbon-bound bundles. The eight reindeer escorted Santa Claus and Miss Susanna gaily up the hall to where a deep, garnet velvet Sleepy Hollow chair stood awaiting an occupant. She hadhardly been established in it when the King of the North Pole and his party arrived.
“My reindeer will entertain you with a song and dance,” Santa Claus piped up, when the first buzz of voices and echoing laughter had died out in the big room. “After that my fiddler will furnish music and we will all have a dance. I will lead with my little friend, Susie. Please don’t all try to dance at once with the King of the North Pole.”
“No one except Jeremiah Macy would offer such simple advice,” Muriel pleasantly told the king himself. “Too bad you have no gentleman friends besides Santa Claus.”
“Oh, but I have,” was the king’s cheering disclosure.
“Really?” Muriel showed deep interest. “Where do you keep them?”
“That’s a secret.” The king put on an aggravatingly wise expression. “There are lots of good hiding places at the North Pole.”
“Just as I thought!” Muriel exclaimed in triumph. “I knew you and Jeremiah couldn’t stay away from home all day at the picnic and do this decorating between dinner time and eight o’clock. You had help—h-e-l-p!”
“Certainly I had,” the king admitted. “Generaland Captain were here and helped the Governor and Mother trim the tree. So did Delia. But they’ve gone home now to trim Marjorie’s tree.” He regarded Muriel with an innocent candor which the sparkle in his eyes contradicted.
“You can’t fool me, Mister King of the North Pole Macy,” she said as the eight reindeer trotted out upon the waxed floor to do their bit toward entertaining. Before they had time to begin their song Muriel’s fingers flashed to her lips. Twice she sounded the sharp clear whistle which she and Jerry had long ago made Hal teach them how to blow on the fingers.
“Now you have done it!” The king laughed nevertheless as the ball room door swung open and a troop of joyfully grinning young men filed in, led by Danny Seabrooke. “Who told you the signal?” he demanded.
“I knew if Danny Seabrooke was within hearing of it, he’d come at that whistle. And he did,” laughed Muriel. “You had Danny and his crowd tucked away in the garret next to the ball room.”
“You should have seen them work after we brought the decorations up here from the wagon. We had only about an hour and a half for the job and I had to leave before it was finished and go withJerry—Santa Claus, I should say.” Hal exhibited boyish pride in the success of the decorating. “I’d have invited the fellows anyway, on my own say-so. Think Danny and I are crazy to be the only fellows in such an aggregation of girls?”
At sight of the troop of joyful intruders panic overtook two of the reindeer and they fled to the safety of Miss Susanna’s protection. One of them was Lucy Warner, who was noted for her bashful fear of young men. The other was Neva Worden, an equally timid dormitory girl. Neither would consent to perform for the benefit of the newcomers. Jerry and Ronny, in giggling distraction over this unexpected hitch in the program finally posed them, one on either side of Miss Susanna’s chair, ostensibly as ornaments, while their six unabashed companions sang a jolly English roundelay, at the same time executing a lively little dance around the Lady of the Arms, waving their antlers and jingling their bells.
Phil, as the fiddler, presently came forward to play for the dance Santa Claus had graciously announced. Her usual picturesque style was intensified by a costume consisting of baggy black velvet knickers, a velvet coat of forest green with a skull cap to match. Her white cotton blouse fell away from her firm white throat in a wide rolling collar. Twopeacock feathers were thrust through her cap. Black stockings and brown suede sandals lent the last touch of the artistic unusual to her. Her violin swung from her shoulder on a broad green ribbon. Her bright loosened hair under her tiny cap gave her a thoroughly Bohemian appearance.
Tucking her violin under her chin she drew forth the familiar marshalling strains of the Virginia reel. She raised her head a little from her violin and laughed softly as her quick ear caught the sound of another violin besides her own. As she continued to play a slim black-eyed boy with a shock of heavy black hair thrown off his forehead came forward from where he had been concealed behind the Christmas tree. Under his chin was a violin. He was playing the old reel in perfect time with Phil. This was her introduction to Charlie Stevens, now a “big” boy and qualified to play in “a big band.”
Miss Susanna and Santa Claus led off in the reel. The King of the North Pole followed with tiny Vera. Leila accepted Danny Seabrooke as a partner and Robin fell to Miles Burton. Ronny danced it with Mr. Macy, who had come up to “see the fun,” and Mrs. Macy danced with Harry Lenox. The rest of the girls paired off with the remainder of Hal’sdelegation of Sanford boys, and the house rang with the laughter and cheer of the occasion.
Marjorie’s partner chanced to be Danny Seabrooke’s brother Donald, a junior at Weston High. As she stood between Leila and Barbara Severn in the merry line of girls awaiting her turn to dance she was reminded of the changes that had taken place since the first time she had danced a Virginia reel in the Macy’s ball room. She sorely missed Connie and Laurie. This was the second Christmas Eve without them. She recalled how she and Laurie and Connie had worked to make a happy Christmas for little Charlie when first she had known Connie and him. Now here was Charlie, a tall, sturdy boy, with not many years between him and manhood.
Three girls were missing tonight from the old happy sextette. Connie, Irma and Susan Atwell. Connie was far away across the ocean. Irma was visiting her aunt in New York and buying her trousseau. The Atwells had moved to San Francisco. Harriet Delaney, the seventh chum the sextette had invited into their close little band, had made a successful New York debut in grand opera. Mary Raymond, her first chum, had long been in distant Colorado. And Mary was going to be married!
They were all dearer to her than ever, she reflected. A warmth of fresh affection for her absent friends surged up in her heart. Followed a sense of tender exultation as she looked up and down the rows of gay, voluable dancers. How very rich in present friends she was! Present and absent, they were all hers; to have and to hold. Surely love, the love of which Hal had wistfully talked to her, could not be more wonderful than friendship.
Involuntarily her eyes strayed to Hal, vividly, romantically handsome in his sparkling white regalia of the frozen zone. “He looks like the hero of a Norse myth,” was her thought. “When we go back to Hamilton, I’m going to ask Leila to write a Norse play and call it—” Marjorie deliberated. Her gaze continued to rest unsentimentally on Hal as he stood at the foot of the line, exchanging humorous sallies with the two fiddlers. “The Knight of the Northern Sun,” she decided inspirationally. “Gussie Forbes can play the part of the knight. Her shoulders are almost as broad as Hal’s.”
Occupied with the fun of the moment, Hal failed to note the admiring, concentrated gaze of the sparkling brown eyes he loved best. He had resolutely steeled himself to play the part for which Marjorie had cast him in the drama of life—that of devotedfriend. Nor did Marjorie dream that in visualizing Hal as a magnificent Norse knight she had challenged a romantic side of her nature of which she had not believed herself possessed.
CHAPTER XII.CHRISTMAS AT CASTLE DEAN
“Have peace my lambs on Christmas Day,The white light shines across the way.The angelkind look down and singUpon the little new-born King.The manger’s straw—a sorry bedFor Him to lay His baby head;Yet, sweet, my lambs, the light streamed freeAcross man’s lost eternity.”
“Have peace my lambs on Christmas Day,The white light shines across the way.The angelkind look down and singUpon the little new-born King.The manger’s straw—a sorry bedFor Him to lay His baby head;Yet, sweet, my lambs, the light streamed freeAcross man’s lost eternity.”
“Have peace my lambs on Christmas Day,The white light shines across the way.The angelkind look down and singUpon the little new-born King.The manger’s straw—a sorry bedFor Him to lay His baby head;Yet, sweet, my lambs, the light streamed freeAcross man’s lost eternity.”
“Have peace my lambs on Christmas Day,
The white light shines across the way.
The angelkind look down and sing
Upon the little new-born King.
The manger’s straw—a sorry bed
For Him to lay His baby head;
Yet, sweet, my lambs, the light streamed free
Across man’s lost eternity.”
Miss Susanna awoke on Christmas morning with the sound of fresh, young, tuneful voices in her delighted ears. Her door stood half open which explained why she could understand so clearly the quaint words of the old Irish carol which floated up to her on an harmonic tide from downstairs.
She was so raptly engaged in listening she neither heard Marjorie’s light step or saw her witching face framed for a brief second in the half-open doorway.Marjorie gleefully tiptoed down stairs to report the awakening of the Lady of the Arms.
“Let us sing Brooke Hamilton’s favorite, ‘God rest you merry, gentlemen,’ though it is one merry little lady who will get no more rest in bed this day,” Leila said drolly, after hearing Marjorie’s report.
“You should have seen her! She was sitting straight up in bed, looking so happy, and as though she was loving the music. After we sing this carol, I’ll take her breakfast up to her. After breakfast we’ll escort her downstairs to see our tree and—”
“You can’t lose me,” remarked a matter-of-fact voice from the doorway. Miss Susanna trotted toward the group at the piano, looking smaller than ever in her warm, blue eider down dressing gown.
“So we notice,” laughed Vera.
“And I notice you have been booning, as the Irish say, with Jeremiah Macy,” was Leila’s sly comment. “Such slang!”
“Something like that,” impishly returned Miss Susanna. She showed marked enjoyment of her own lapse into slang.
“What is your pleasure first, Lady of the Arms?” Marjorie inquired, as she led Miss Susanna to a brocade chaise lounge, the nearest seat to a gorgeous heavily-laden Christmas tree.
“Sing me his favorite carol.” Miss Susanna gently tweaked one of Marjorie’s brown curls. To please the girls she had allowed her curls to hang, decorated by a pale pink satin topknot bow, which matched her pale pink negligee.
“With pleasure.” Marjorie dropped a light kiss on the old lady’s hand, then joined the group at the piano. Robin instantly touched the light opening strains and started the stately English carol.
They sang it as they had sung it many times before with all the expression and animation of youth for its old-world charm. When they had finished Robin slipped from the piano stool with: “No more carols after that for a while.N’est ce pas, Miss Susanna.”
“Oui,” responded the last of the Hamiltons absently. She glanced immediately at Robin, however, with her quick bright smile. “I will tell you some day why it was his favorite carol,” she said. “Not today. It is too sad a story for today. I wish only to be happy while I am at Castle Dean.”
“And you’re going to be. The next happiness today will be breakfast. You upset Captain’s and my plan to serve it to you in bed. And the next happiness after that will be our Christmas tree.” Marjorie caught Miss Susanna’s hands and pulled herto her feet with a frisky show of energy. She placed light hands on the old lady’s shoulders and marched her ahead to the dining room.
Miss Hamilton was the only late breakfaster, the girls having been up and stirring early. Each had had a mysterious visit to the drawing room tree to make, there to deposit under its spreading branches her own consignment of holiday bundles. Miss Susanna’s consignment had been turned over to Captain Dean with due secrecy, shortly after her arrival at Castle Dean.
Her bodyguard trailed faithfully in her wake to the dining room there to supplement the breakfast they had already eaten with sticky cinnamon buns and coffee. “Not because we are stuffers,” Robin carefully exonerated; “merely to keep you company, Miss Susanna.”
Afterward they went upstairs in leisurely fashion to dress for the day. It was to be “a regular dress parade,” each girl having brought with her from Hamilton what she considered her prettiest afternoon gown. General Dean had ordered assembly in the drawing room at eleven o’clock sharp. He had placed conspicuously in the hall a large notice which stated:
“The Army is hereby ordered to appear in the assembly room of the barrack at eleven o’clock A.M. in full dress uniform. Any one appearing in forage cap, sweater, boudoir cap or goloshes will be severely disciplined. No carrying of canes, bumbershoots or other civil impedimenta will be tolerated. Tardiness and failure to comply with orders will be punished by loss of presents. Forfeited presents will be confiscated by General Dean as chief nabbing officer of the day. Signed.General Dean.”
The worthy general himself presently appeared and took a determined stand in the hall where he could keep an eye on matters. Frequent ringing of the door bell kept him occupied in hustling to the door. Before long he had admitted Lucy, Kathie, Ronny, Jerry, Helen, Hal, Charlie Stevens and Muriel.
Upstairs Miss Susanna and the four girls wondered as they completed their Christmas toilettes what was the occasion for the treble shrieks of mirth which invariably followed the opening of the heavy front door.
“What is that ridiculous general of yours up to now, I wonder?” Miss Susanna said to Marjorie and her mother, who had come into the old lady’sroom to admire her in the beauty of an imported gown of wisteria satin, paneled and further embellished with rose-patterned deep natural silk lace.
“Let’s find out this minute. Come, my fair lady in silk and lace.” Marjorie crooked her arm invitingly to Miss Hamilton. “Ready, girls?” she called back, as the two began a buoyant descent of the stairs, with Captain, smiling indulgently, in their wake.
“Te, he, he,” Miss Susanna’s own special chuckle was heard as she caught sight of General Dean.
The high executive of military maneuvers of the Dean Barrack had obeyed his own order to appear in full dress. He wore a pair of leaf green trousers and a scarlet uniform coat heavily trimmed with gilt braid. On his head perched a bright green fez with a long scarlet plume curving around it and far down on one shoulder. Added to the plume a sprig of holly had been neatly fastened on the front of the fez.
“I see nothing to laugh at,” he sternly reprimanded the mirthful trio on the stairs. “I am giving what I consider a faithful representation of the holiday spirit.”
“You look like a chocolate nut nightmare,” Lieutenant Dean disrespectfully compared.
“I never saw one, so how can I possibly know how I look.”
“A two-pound ration of chocolate nuts eaten before Taps will introduce you to one,” retorted the lieutenant.
“Two hours in the guard house for disrespect to a superior officer,” penalized General Dean. “Forward march. Don’t block the highway. Discipline must be preserved in the Army. Three at the head of the stairs—quick time, March,” he rumbled as he spied Leila, Vera and Robin about to descend.
Miss Hamilton’s entrance into the drawing room was the signal for a chorus of Christmas greetings from the lively company now in possession of the apartment. Jerry led her under the mistletoe bough, which decorated the top of the indirect dome, and kissed her on both cheeks. The others followed her example.
“What have you done with your guests?” she demanded of her affectionate callers. “I am surprised at you for running away from them! What must they think of you?” She drew down her small features in exaggerated disapproval. Her bright, bird-like eyes wandered from one to another of the frolicsome group. She read pleasant, suppressedexcitement in every face. She innocently attributed the cause of the mysterious, smiling air of the callers to a probable delightful conspiracy on their part against General and Captain Dean. She did not stop to consider herself. She was of the grateful opinion that she had been already surfeited with generous, loving attention.
“We have to obey orders.” Lucy Warner volunteered this over-solemn information. “‘Obedience is a soldier’s first duty,’” she quoted tritely.
“When the bugle calls, et cetera, et cetera, you know,” Jerry helped the old saw along. She waved a plump hand by way of furthering her vague explanation.
“I never heard a bugle call et cetera, et cetera,” General Dean remarked in interested wonder. “I shall investigate the matter as soon as I am off duty.”
“I’ll help you,” offered Miss Susanna, to the open and pronounced glee of the high executive officer. “Such a phenomenon should be investigated.”
“We may need the services of these two civilians,” General Dean airily indicated Hal and Charlie Stevens. “Let me see. What was it we were going to investigate? I have so many important matterson my mind, I—” He grew cheerfully apologetic.
“Don’t try to implicate us,” warned Hal.
“Please, sir, we’re only a couple of Christmas strays,” Charlie Stevens rolled humorous black eyes at Mr. Dean. He was still the droll youngster of early childhood days, but now coming into a boyish appreciation of the spirit of humor which always prevailed in the little circle of young folks unconsciously dominated by Marjorie’s friendly ways.
“Sh-h-h! I know it.” The General whispered loudly to Charlie behind his hand. “I hadn’t intended to mention it.” He elevated his heavy eyebrows to an alarming degree. “Since you’ve given yourself and your partner away you’d best try to become social successes.”
“Much obliged, old top.” Hal indecorously lifted the General’s Christmas fez from his head, then jammed it down again on the presiding officer’s crown. “I’m going to offer the season’s greetings to my little lavender Lady.” He and Charlie at once began to pay extravagant court to Miss Susanna.
General Dean continued to buzz about among the congenial little throng with a great deal of loud remark concerning “the promoting of good behavior in the Army.” At length he succeeded in seatingthe animated, festive detachment to his liking. He assigned Miss Susanna to the center of the gold brocade chaise lounge and ranged Marjorie and Leila on each side of her. The others he ordered into an open group about the golden dais. Finally he appeared satisfied. He crossed the room to the gift tree at a magnificent military strut:
“Attention,” he boomed in a voice so stentorian it set the chattering formation to laughing.