Marjorie Dean High School Senior Part 26

"Who told _you_ I was going to run away from home?" flashed Mignon, whirling fiercely upon Marjorie.

"No one told me," was the steady admission. "It just came to me all of a sudden. If I'm wrong, forgive me. If I'm right, then please don't do it." Marjorie's voice rose beseechingly. "You have everything in the world to make you happy. Your father loves you, even if he _is_ angry with you now. No one else will ever take care of you as he has."

"My father _hates_ me," contradicted Mignon savagely. "If he really cared for me he could never send me away to be a prisoner in a convent school. Yes, I am going to leave home, and you nor anyone else shall stop me. Everybody hates me and I hate everybody!" The last word ended in a pa.s.sionate sob of mingled rage and humiliation. Mignon was now tasting the bitterness of one against whom the world has turned.

"Poor Mignon." Moved by sincere pity, Marjorie laid a comforting hand on the would-be refugee's arm.

That gentle expression of sympathy, accompanied by the tender little caress, stirred into life an emotion hitherto unknown to Mignon's rebellious soul. a.s.sailing her as a climax to the strain of the past few days, it completely unnerved her. Her self-control vanis.h.i.+ng she dropped her suitcase and burst into wild weeping. Winding her arms about the sobbing girl, Marjorie tried to soothe her as best she might.

Fortunately for them, no pa.s.ser-by intruded upon the little scene. Only the complaining rain lent its monotonous accompaniment to Mignon's sobs.

"Let us go back to your house, Mignon," proposed Marjorie practically with a view toward bracing up the weeper. "Someone is likely to come along and see us. You will go, won't you?"

"Yes," came the husky reply.

"All right." Making an effort to speak with the utmost cheerfulness, Marjorie loosed her hold on Mignon and picked up the suitcase. "I'll carry it," she said. "It's only a little way to your home. But first, I must stop at that little house over there and tell Captain to wait for me longer. I'd like to have a talk with you and you know I am to see your father. Is he at home?"

"Yes. In the library. I left the house by the back entrance so that he wouldn't see me. I hid my suitcase outside," confessed Mignon in a low, shamed voice. "I was going to New York to see Rowena. She promised to help me get on the stage. Her uncle is a theatrical manager."

"I'm glad you have changed your mind," was the hearty a.s.sertion.

Marjorie was thinking that she was not in the least surprised to learn that Rowena Farnham was at the root of Mignon's flight.

"I would never have hidden the money if it hadn't been for her," Mignon continued bitterly. "Still, it's my fault, after all. I shouldn't have listened to her. But this is the end. I'm going to be different, even if my father sends me away to school. I guess I started wrong and somehow could never do right. I deserve to be punished, though. It just breaks my heart when I think of not graduating from Sanford High."

Marjorie listened in wonder. Was it really lawless Mignon who had just spoken so penitently? Could it be that her better self had at last found the light? "You _are_ going to graduate from Sanford High," she declared staunchly. "We must go to your father and tell him everything. I'm sure he'll understand."

Mignon sighed at the prospect ahead of her, yet she made no dissent to Marjorie's plan. She had small faith in her father's clemency, but she had at last taken a step in the right direction and she was resolved to go on. "We might as well go to the front door and ring the bell," she said dejectedly. "I know he'll be terribly angry, but I'll have to stand it."

Mignon's prediction of her father's anger was not an idle one. Of the excitable Latin temperament, his indignation flamed high when the two girls entered the library where he sat quietly reading and Mignon haltingly confessed to him the details of her interrupted flight. His scathing words of rebuke brought on a second flood of tears. Mignon crumpled up in a big chair, a figure of abject misery. It was then that Marjorie took the floor and in her sweet, gracious fas.h.i.+on earnestly pleaded clemency for the weeper.

It was the most difficult task she had ever undertaken to perform.

Exasperated beyond measure, Mr. La Salle at first utterly refused to consider her plea. He could not find it within his heart to forgive his daughter. He was bent on punis.h.i.+ng her with the utmost severity and her latest defiance of him served to strengthen his determination.

Marjorie's repeated a.s.sertion that by her confession Mignon had already proved her sincerity of purpose appeared to carry small weight.

"You do not know this ungrateful one as I, her father, know her," was his incensed retort. "Often she has promised the good behavior, but only promised. Never has she fulfilled the word. How then can she expect that I shall forgive and believe her?"

"But this time Mignon _will_ keep her word," returned Marjorie with gentle insistence. "I am sure that if her mother were living she would forgive and believe. No matter what I had done, _my_ mother would forgive me. If I were truly sorry she would believe in me, too. You are nearest of all in the world to Mignon. Won't you try to overlook the past and let her come back to the senior cla.s.s? Whatever else displeases you in her, she has at least been successful in her studies. She stands high in all her cla.s.ses. She is Professor Fontaine's most brilliant pupil in French. It does seem hard that she should have to give up now what she has so nearly won."

Without realizing it, Marjorie had advanced a particularly effective argument. Mignon's high standing in her various cla.s.ses during her high school career had always afforded her father signal pleasure. Thus reminded, paternal pride awoke and struggled against anger. Marjorie's reference to Mignon's mother had also touched him deeply.

Following her earnest little speech, a brief interval of silence ensued, during which Mr. La Salle stared gloomily at his weeping daughter. Moved by a sudden rush of pity for his motherless girl, he walked over to her and rested a forgiving hand on her diminished head. Very gently he addressed her in his native tongue. Marjorie felt a rush of unbidden tears rise to her own eyes, when the next instant she became witness to a tender reconciliation which she never forgot.

It was nearer two hours than one before she prepared to say good night to the two for whom she had done so much. Brought at last to a state of sympathetic understanding such as they had never before known, father and daughter were loath to part from this sincere, lovely young girl. To Mr. La Salle's proposal to see her safely to the house where her mother awaited her, Marjorie made gracious refusal. She was anxious to get away by herself. The whole affair had been extremely nerve-racking and she longed for the bracing atmosphere of the outdoors as an antidote to the strain she had undergone.

She was visited by a feeling of intense impatience when, stepping into the hall, accompanied by Mignon and her father, the former humbly asked her to delay her departure for a moment. Leaving her, Mignon sped up the front stairs, returning almost instantly. Announcing to her father her wish to go with Marjorie as far as the gate, the now smiling man saw his guest as far as the veranda and retired into the house.

"I have something to give you," began Mignon, as they started down the walk. "It's-that--" she faltered briefly "--that letter Lucy Warner wrote you. I found it in the locker room. I saw it fall out of your blouse-and-I-took it-and-read it. I know it was wrong. Then I kept it. I was angry-because you wouldn't tell me about you and Lucy that day at Miss Archer's. I-made-Lucy think you _had_ told me about it. She wouldn't believe it, so I said, 'What about the Observer?' She thought I knew something I didn't know at all. I had no idea what 'the Observer'

meant. To-morrow I shall go to her and tell her so," she continued bravely. "I'm sorry for all the hateful things I've done to you and said about you. You are the finest, truest girl in the whole world, Marjorie Dean. You've done something for me to-night that I'll remember and be grateful to you for as long as I live. There's not much left of my senior year but I am going to try to make my last days in Sanford High count. Some day I hope I can prove to you that I am worthy of your friends.h.i.+p. But not yet." With this she shoved the troublesome letter into Marjorie's limp hand.

Bereft for the moment of speech, Marjorie clutched the letter, wondering again whether she were actually awake, or living in a queer dream.

Mignon's revelation had laid the last ghost. She had untied the final knot in the tangle of her own making. More, she had given the best possible proof of sincere repentance. "Mignon," it was now Marjorie's voice that trembled, "you've already proved yourself my friend. I'm glad for your sake and Lucy's and mine that you were so brave as to tell me about the letter and return it to me. All I can say is: Let us forget and be friends."

CHAPTER XXVII-COMMENCEMENT

The next morning Miss Archer held a memorable interview in her private office with Mignon La Salle. It was evidently a satisfactory talk. When it terminated, the hands of teacher and pupil met in an understanding clasp. On leaving the inner office, Mignon halted at Lucy Warner's desk, there to perform a difficult act of rest.i.tution.

Not gifted with Marjorie Dean's divine power of forgiveness, Lucy was filled with righteous wrath against Mignon. Added to the anger Mignon's confession aroused was remorse for her unbelief in Marjorie. She vowed bitterly that she would never forgive Mignon and she meant it. It was not until she had made humble amend to Marjorie for her own sins and received gracious pardon, that her better nature began to stir.

Conscience whispering to her that as she had freely received so should she freely give, she went to Mignon and retracted her harsh vow. Thus Marjorie Dean's beneficent influence again made itself felt.

Mignon's return to school occasioned much speculation on the part of her cla.s.s mates. As only the Lookouts knew the true reason of her brief withdrawal from Sanford High, it had been a subject for fruitful cogitation among the other seniors. Not even the Lookouts knew, with one exception, the reason for Mignon's return. Among themselves they laid it to her ability to manage her father. Marjorie, the one exception, kept her own secret. What took place on a certain rainy evening remained locked forever within her heart. Besides the three intimately interested parties to the little drama, only one other shared the secret. From her captain she kept back nothing.

To Marjorie the remaining days of May pa.s.sed with a pleasant uneventfulness, which she mentally likened to the welcome calm that inevitably succeeds a storm. She was filled with a quiet sense of exultation. With the ending of her senior year had come peace. Mignon's miraculous change of heart had resulted in removing from the senior cla.s.s the last element of discord. The seniors were now indeed one heart, one soul, marching on, shoulder to shoulder, toward the end of their high school course.

She had but one regret. She earnestly wished that the new Mignon might again take her place among the Lookouts. The fulfilling of this desire, however, would entail an amount of explanation which she did not feel privileged to make. She and Mignon discussed the painful subject at length, both agreeing sadly that matters must remain as they were.

Having sown chaff with a liberal hand, this unhappy reminder of her treacherous conduct was in itself a part of the bitter harvest Mignon was obliged to reap. As she had meted it out to others, so it had been measured back to her. With the belated realization, however, had come resigned acceptance. Mignon's feet were at last planted firmly in the straight path.

The arrival of rose-decked June marked the beginning of the pleasant flurry which always attends the sweet girl graduate's preparations for Commencement. Strolling home from school each afternoon in the warm suns.h.i.+ne of early summer, Marjorie and her devoted companions brimmed with eager conversation relating to the momentous occasion. With Commencement exercises set for the morning of June twenty-second, they were divided between antic.i.p.ation of the event and regret at saying good-bye to Sanford High.

The day nursery was also an important topic of discussion. Although their successors had been already chosen, they were not expected to take up their new responsibilities until school re-opened in the fall. The original Lookouts had decided to carry on the work as best they could through the summer. Vacation time would see a part of their number absent from Sanford during one or more of the summer months. In consequence the daily pilgrimages to the nursery at which they had taken turns could not continue. Each girl had agreed, however, to go there as often as possible to a.s.sist the two women in charge, who were permanently attached to the place.

Their chief anxiety for the welfare of the little home they had founded related to money matters. The present prosperous state of the Lookouts'

treasury would keep the enterprise in a flouris.h.i.+ng condition until well into the next year. After that they could only hope that their successors would find ways and means to continue the good work. They had solemnly pledged themselves to pay a year's dues in advance into the treasury before leaving home in the autumn to continue their education in the various colleges of their choice. They were also resolved to get together during the next Christmas vacation and devise some sort of entertainment which their town folks would patronize. This much at least they could offer to the cause they had so generously espoused.

Lingering at the Macys' gate on the way from school one afternoon to discuss this very important subject, Jerry remarked confidentially: "I almost forgot to tell you a real piece of news. My father told me about it this noon. Someone, he wouldn't say who, has offered Sanford High a scholars.h.i.+p to Hamilton College. The name of the giver is to be announced on Commencement morning with the winner's name. We'll probably hear about it at chapel to-morrow morning. I thought you'd like to know beforehand. It's a splendid chance for Lucy Warner or Veronica, for that matter. They're both brilliant students. Either is likely to win it."

"Isn't that wonderful?" glowed Marjorie. "I don't know which of the two I'd rather see win it. Lucy's heart is set on going to college. I've never heard Ronny say anything about it. I suppose she would like to go on with her education, though."

"Of course you've never heard her say a word about it," retorted Jerry, "or about anything else. She's beyond me. I said when I first met her that I was going to find out the whys and wherefores of her. I've never found out a thing. Where she learned to dance so beautifully, where those two expensive dancing dresses came from, why she works for her board and looks like a princess, are mysteries I can't ferret out. She's a perfect dear and has helped the Lookouts a lot, but she's the great enigma, just the same."

"It's rather queer about her," mused Marjorie. "I used to think that she'd some day explain a few things. Perhaps there's really nothing mysterious to explain. She is probably a natural dancer. Miss Archer must have given her those two beautiful dresses and she was born with the air of a princess."

"That's not the answer," disagreed Jerry with a shake of her head. "I guess it's the only one we'll ever get, though, so why worry about it?

I'm a baffled sleuth and I might as well own up to it. I can't truthfully say now that I know everything about everybody."

Jerry's admitted mystification regarding Veronica Browning deepened considerably. When the club met at Marjorie's home the next evening, the latter quietly a.s.sured her that she had no intention to try for the scholars.h.i.+p. The announcement of it and the details of the test examinations to be held to determine the winner, having been publicly made that very morning, it was freely discussed at the meeting. Of the Lookouts, it appeared that Lucy Warner was the only one to try for it.

Several members of the senior cla.s.s, outside the club, had also entered the lists.

The parting of the ways so near, the s.e.xtette of girls who had emerged from their freshman year, a devoted band, clung fondly to one another.

Not even the glories of approaching Commencement and the consciousness of work well done could drive away the thought that their school days together would soon be a thing of the past. Commencement would witness a break in the fond little circle. The next fall Marjorie, Jerry and Muriel were to take up their new life at Hamilton College. Susan and Irma expected to enter Wellesley College, while Constance Stevens would begin her training for grand opera in New York City. It would indeed be a parting of the ways.

Although Harriet Delaney had not been of their original number, she was equally dear. It was a source of consolation to Marjorie that Harriet was also bound for the same conservatory as Constance. She reflected that, with Hamilton College not very far from New York, she would be always in direct touch with both girls. It was conceded by all that they would miss Veronica sorely. Several times Marjorie had questioned her regarding her future plans, only to receive evasive replies that discouraged further inquiry.

So while June laughed its fragrant, blossoming way toward the twenty-second of the month, the s.e.xtette of sworn friends became doubly endeared to one another as they took their last walks together to and from school. As Lookouts they would continue to meet regularly until their vacation flittings began, but as schoolmates their days were numbered. Having disposed of their final tests in January, they were free of the bugbear of examinations. The week preceding Commencement Day took on a singularly social tone. Jerry and Hal gave their long postponed dance. Constance gave an informal hop at Gray Gables. Muriel sent out invitations for a lawn party, and Marjorie entertained the Lookouts at a Sat.u.r.day luncheon.

Commencement Day dawned with a cloudless blue sky and a lavish display of suns.h.i.+ne. More than one pair of anxious feet pattered to the window before seven o'clock that morning to view the weather prospects. To the members of the senior cla.s.s it was thus far the most eventful day in their short lives. They considered it quite their due that Nature should put on her most radiantly smiling face in their honor.