Marjorie Dean College Freshman Part 21

"Yes; much obliged chimes," echoed Jerry. "It will be quite awhile before we hear your melodious voice again. There, that's my last package." She laid an oblong bundle on a pile beside her with an audible sigh of satisfaction.

"Mine, too. Come on, Lucy, we must turn in. Shoo, shoo, Muriel. Go right straight to your room. It's late. Didn't you know it." Ronny made a playful attempt to drive Muriel to the door. The latter braced her feet and stood her ground. Both girls were laughing as were also the three onlookers. The sound of mirth could be faintly heard in the hall.

Coming in from a motor ride with several of the Sans, Natalie Weyman heard the laughter as she pa.s.sed Marjorie's room on the way to her own.

Her face clouded perceptibly. What a lot those girls seemed to find to laugh at, was her resentful thought. She was always hearing sounds of laughter from both Marjorie's room and that of her friend across the hall. It was evident they did not quarrel much. For an instant Natalie wished she knew them better. Leslie and Dulcie were always so disagreeable unless they could have their own way. Remembering her grudge against Marjorie, her lips tightened. What she really wished was not to know Marjorie better; only to be even with her for what she considered an irreparable injury done her.

CHAPTER XXIV.-THE FIRST VICTORY.

After two weeks of undiluted happiness at home, Marjorie's return to Hamilton was a wrench, keenly felt by all immediately concerned.

According to her own ideas it was like a plant; nicely rooted in one soil, only to be jerked up by the roots and transplanted. Once returned to Wayland Hall, it took her longer to settle down than at Thanksgiving.

She had little spells of yearning for her father and mother which only time dimmed.

For a week following the return of the Five Travelers to Hamilton, they heard nothing of basket ball interests save that Miss Reid had still made no reply to the letter sent her. Another week pa.s.sed, during which the fall term ended and two days of written tests ensued. Then came one day of vacation which was always given the students of Hamilton at the closing of a term. It was on the afternoon of this holiday that the freshman cla.s.s, minus fourteen members, who had purposely been left out, met in the living room of Silverton Hall. It was a tight squeeze, but every one of the sixty-eight girls managed to crowd into the room.

Portia Graham stood on a chair backed against the wall to address them.

When she had finished speaking the room rang with cheers. She had advocated a committee to wait on Miss Reid and insist on fair treatment.

"In the event that Miss Reid refuses us justice, are you in favor of taking our grievance higher?" she questioned in purposeful tones.

"YES!" was the unanimous shout.

"Contrary?" she inquired sweetly, but there were no contrary members present.

"Are you satisfied with the choice of the following members as a committee? Their names are: Veronica Lynne, Marjorie Dean, Muriel Harding, Elaine Hunter, Mary Cornell, Portia Graham."

Another resounding affirmative, followed by no dissenting voices, was immediately forthcoming.

"That settles it," she declared grimly. "We will call on Miss Reid tomorrow evening at eight o'clock. For the benefit of any one not yet familiar with Hamilton, I will say that Miss Reid lives at Randolph House. If she is not in, we will make another call on the next evening.

I ask you on your honor as freshmen of 19- not to speak of this to anyone after you leave here."

At ten minutes to eight the next evening the committee met in front of Wayland Hall and proceeded across the campus toward the north to Randolph House which was devoted to faculty. They walked briskly along on the frozen lawn, almost in silence. Portia was to be spokesman, and she was mentally framing her remarks as she went. She was not in the least diffident when it came to facing Miss Reid, and she intended to drive home her point.

The a.s.surance of the maid who answered their ring that Miss Reid was in, sent a queer little thrill over them all. Marjorie smiled to herself as she entered the reception room. This was not the first disagreeable call she had been obliged by duty to make.

A ten-minutes' wait, during which they conversed a little in low tones, and Miss Reid appeared. She was a tall woman, rather attractive at first glance, but not as one studied her features. Her small black eyes were shrewd and furtive, while the expression of her full face in repose was self-satisfied rather than agreeable.

"Good evening," she saluted, in an uninterested tone. She looked from one to another of her visitors as though nonplussed by the invasion.

Both tone and look were intended to deceive. Miss Reid guessed the nature of the call.

"Good evening," was the united salutation. The committee viewed the instructor with a gravity which nettled her.

"We called this evening, Miss Reid," Portia began sternly, "because you have paid no attention to the letter we sent you before the holidays. It was signed by more than two-thirds of the freshman cla.s.s and merited a reply which you did not make. We were serious in our intent, and expected you would treat our complaint with traditional courtesy. You did not. We have, therefore, come here to ask you if you intend to grant us the justice of a new team."

"Certainly not." A tide of dull color had risen to Miss Reid's face as she listened to Portia's blunt arraignment. Her eyes had begun to snap and her p.r.o.nounced black brows were drawn together. "You are insolent, Miss Graham. I simply will not discuss the matter with you. I will say only that the present team remains, with the exception of Miss Page. I have requested her resignation. Her team-mates complain she is not fast enough for the work. I mailed her a note this afternoon. You must understand that you cannot fly in the face of a member of the faculty and hope to gain by such an act. I am amazed at freshman-we will say-temerity."

A sinister stillness followed Miss Reid's caustic retaliation. A battery of scornful eyes was leveled at the disgruntled instructor. The very air was thick with the committee's displeasure. This latest piece of injustice, directed against Robin Page, capped the climax. It was two minutes, at least, before Portia could trust her voice in a reply. She was angry enough to wrathfully denounce Miss Reid, then and there.

"It will not be necessary for Miss Page to resign from the team. She has already been sufficiently humiliated by having been identified with a set of scrub players. There will be a new freshman team and Miss Page will play on it. I am certain that Doctor Matthews will understand that something of unusual unfairness has happened to stir the majority of the freshman cla.s.s into revolt." Every word Portia uttered cut clearly on the stillness of the room.

"Oh, not the majority of the freshman cla.s.s, Miss Graham." Miss Reid's intonation was that of one correcting a glaring exaggeration. It was accompanied by a smile of malicious incredulity.

"If you will refer to the letter sent you before the holidays, you will find that it was signed by sixty-eight freshmen. The cla.s.s numbers eighty-two. A meeting of the sixty-eight freshmen who resent your unfairness was called yesterday. The result-we are here tonight."

Portia's retort was laden with cold, uncompromising dignity.

It was distinctly chilling to the physical instructor's audacious stand.

For the first time since her entrance into the room she became ill at ease. The force with which she had to deal was altogether too active for comfort. She knew that Portia would keep her word. With sixty-eight incensed freshmen at her back, Doctor Matthews would not only listen but investigate. An investigation would be decidedly humiliating to her, and also jeopardize her position at Hamilton. She found herself caught between two fires. She had promised Leslie Cairns that Lola Elster's team would win. It would not be easy to pacify Leslie if she acceded to the committee's demand. Self-preservation must be considered first, however. After the high hand she had just taken in answering Portia, she hardly knew what to say.

"I-that is--" she began, stopped, then said with as much of an attempt at offended dignity as she could muster: "I cannot talk further with you concerning this matter tonight. I have an engagement with two members of the faculty and am already late. If you will come to the gymnasium at four o'clock tomorrow afternoon I will see what I can do to pacify the freshman cla.s.s. I would prefer resigning all interest in basket ball rather than be the center of a freshman quarrel." She rose from her chair, as though determined to end the uncomfortable interview.

"Very well," Portia coldly inclined her head. "We shall expect to see you in the gymnasium at four o'clock. We will not detain you longer."

She rose. Her companions immediately followed suit. Portia's "good evening" was echoed by the others as they filed through the door, their soft, young faces set in cold contempt.

Not a word pa.s.sed among them until they were well away from the house.

Elaine Hunter was the first to speak. "Did you ever see anyone more upset than Miss Reid was toward the last?" she asked her companions in general.

"She had good reason to be," returned Portia grimly. "We have won our point. I hope she does resign basket ball management. A senior told me recently that she has always been a bugbear to the teams. She insists on managing everything and everybody who will let her. Miss Reid has had the reputation for years of favoring money and fighting principle. She has repeatedly used basket ball favors as means of ingratiating herself with wealthy students. If she really makes good what she said about resigning it will be the first important victory for democracy at Hamilton."

CHAPTER XXV.-A NEW CONSPIRACY.

Not daring to break the appointment she had made with the freshman committee, Miss Reid met them the next afternoon in the gymnasium at the time she had set. She had been very careful, in the meantime, not to come in contact with Leslie Cairns or Lola Elster. Deep in her soul, she was raging at the choice which had been forced upon her. Fear of losing her position of years' standing at Hamilton, and the even more active fear that perhaps her connivance with Leslie Cairns was known in college, urged her to shun campus publicity. Resignation was the one way out of her difficulties with both parties. It would check all freshman activities against her. As for Leslie, what could she say or do in the face of it? She would be angry, of course, and insulting. Insults, however, broke no bones. Leslie could not circulate malicious reports about her without implicating herself. To resign also meant a saving of dignity. Miss Reid determined, therefore, to resign, but without appointing a time for a new try-out. She would slide from under and let the freshmen straighten the snarl as best they might.

A plan is not a success until it has been carried out. This Miss Reid learned at her second interview with the committee. Portia, backed by the other members of the committee, insisted that Miss Reid should sign a notice of her own composition, announcing a new try-out.

"You may say, if you choose, that, owing to the dissatisfaction of the preponderance of the freshman cla.s.s with the work of the present basket ball team, you have been requested by a committee, representing freshman interests, to call another try-out for the purpose of selecting another team, composed of players, adequate to the work."

"But no such thing has ever been heard of, much less done, here at Hamilton," objected Miss Reid, when Portia coolly outlined the notice.

"It has been heard of now and must be done," came the instant answer. "I a.s.sure you, Miss Reid, that you will go further toward gaining the respect of the students by being impersonal in this affair. You have been severely criticized for allowing so inadequate a team to take the floor. On the day of the first try-out good players were ignored and unskilful ones chosen. You will gain more by rectifying this error. You owe it to yourself to do so before you resign. We freshmen prefer the seniors as managers of our college sports. You have not been just with us and we have resented your injustice."

Portia's denunciation of the physical instructor's methods was, undoubtedly, candid. It had the desired effect, however. Miss Reid wrote and posted the notice. Further, she sent a frigid little note to the senior manager of college sports, whom she had treated so discourteously on the day of the try-out, renouncing all voice and interest in basket ball.

The victorious committee's next move was to get in touch with the senior sports committee of three, which included Miss Clement, the senior manager, and notify them of the complete revolution of affairs. The two who had sided with Miss Reid agreed quite meekly now with the committee's ideas. The try-out was held in the gymnasium shortly after the notice had been posted, and, for once, a team was made up on its merits. Robin Page again made good and won the coveted position of center. The request for her resignation from the other team had not specially troubled Robin, knowing that a shake-up was imminent.

Four released and exasperated freshmen, headed by Lola Elster and reinforced by the ten cla.s.smates in sympathy with the ex-team besieged Miss Reid, demanding re-instatement. She very quickly thrust the burden on the shoulders of the senior sports committee. She made it plain to her favorites, also, just who was responsible for the affair. As they had no case they dared not take their grievance higher. What they proceeded to do was seek the consolation of the Sans, all fourteen of them being at least eligible to a.s.sociation with these exclusives. Their domineering soph.o.m.ore sisters obligingly promised them vengeance against the obnoxious committee.

Leslie Cairns' receipt of the movement against collusion was a fit of temper such as she seldom gave way to. Spying the notice on the bulletin board, she deliberately ripped it off and tore it to bits. Then she set off for the gymnasium at a pace quite foreign to her usual leisurely gait. Luckily for Miss Reid, she happened to be elsewhere at the time.

Thus, when she and Leslie came to cla.s.ses on the following afternoon, the latter had calmed considerably. She did not spare the older woman's feelings, but scored her sharply for "bungling" and then leaving her friends in the lurch in order to save herself.

"You may say what you please, Leslie, but it would have done no good to defy them," the instructor defended. "The freshman cla.s.s this year is a collection of young anarchists. I would advise you to be very careful what you do. There has not been such a cla.s.s in years at Hamilton. A few more like it and Hamilton will lose its reputation as a really exclusive college."

"What Hamilton ought to lose is some of its fres.h.i.+e freshmen," retorted Leslie. "I have a friend who knows a lot about one of them, at least, and she probably knows enough about some others to queer them here. I mean those ninnies from that little one-horse town of Sanford. The whole five of them are an eyesore to me. The only one who hates 'em harder than I do, is Nat. She never will forgive that moon-eyed Miss Dean for putting it over her at the Beauty contest. Leila Harper was back of that. She is another I could see leave Hamilton without going into mourning."