"Sorry"s no name for it," declared Jerry. "We certainly had one beautiful time, I mean a beautiful time. Honestly, I liked the getting things ready for other folks best of all, though. I like to keep busy. I wish we had something to do or somebody to help all the time. I"m going to poke around and see what I can stir up. I try to do the sisterly, helpful act toward Hal; picking up the stuff he strews all over the house and locating lost junk, I mean articles, but he"s about as appreciative as a Feejee Islander. You know how grateful they are."
"I saw one in a circus once," laughed Constance reminiscently. "I wasn"t impressed with his sense of grat.i.tude. Someone threw him a peanut and he flung it back and hit an old gentleman in the eye."
A general giggle arose at the erring Feejee"s strange conception of grat.i.tude.
"That will be nice to tell Hal when he shows the same delicate sort of thankfulness," grinned Jerry. "I"m not going to waste my precious talents on him all winter. I"m going to dig up something better. If you girls hear of anything, run all the way to our house, any hour of the day or night, and tell your friend Jerry Geraldine Jeremiah. All three are one, as Rudyard Kipling says in something or other he wrote."
"I love Kipling"s books," said Constance. "One of the first things I did when I wasn"t poor any longer was to buy a whole set. That first year at Sanford High I tried to get them in the school library. But there were only two or three of them."
"That library is terribly run down," a.s.serted Jerry. "They haven"t half the books there they ought to have. I was talking to my father about it the other night. He promised to put it before the Board. I hope he does.
Then maybe we"ll get some more books. I don"t care so much for myself. I can get all the books I want. But there are a lot of girls that can"t, who need special ones for reading courses."
Jerry"s resolve to "poke around and stir up something" did not meet with any special success. The more needy of the Christmas poor were already being looked after by Mrs. Dean, Mrs. Macy and other charitably disposed persons who devoted themselves to the cause of benevolence the year around. Generous-hearted Jerry continued to help in the good work, but her active nature was still on the alert for some special object.
"I"ve dug it up," she announced in triumph, several evenings later. The three girls were conducting a prudent review at Jerry"s home, preparatory to the rapidly approaching mid-year test.
"What did you say, Jerry?" Marjorie tore her eyes from her French grammar, over which she had been poring. "I was so busy trying to fix the conjugation of these miserable, irregular verbs in my mind that I didn"t hear you."
"I"ve dug up the great idea; the how-to-be-helpful stunt. It"s right in our school, too, that our labors are needed."
"That"s interesting; ever so much more so than this." Constance Stevens closed the book she held with a snap. "I"m not a bit fond of German,"
she added. "I have to study it, though, on account of the Wagner operas.
This "_Hoher als die Kirche_" is a pretty story, but it"s terribly hard to translate. We"ll have several pages of it to do in examination.
Excuse me, Jerry, for getting off the subject. What is it that you"ve dug up?"
"It"s about the library. You know I told you that my father was going to speak of it at the Board meeting. Well, he did, but it wasn"t any use.
There have been such a lot of appropriations made for other things that the library will have to wait. That"s what the high and mighty Board say. This is what _I_ say. Why not get busy among ourselves and dig up some money for new books?"
"You mean by subscription?" asked Marjorie.
"No, siree. I mean by earning it ourselves," proposed Jerry.
"Subscription would mean that a lot of girls would feel that they ought to give something which they couldn"t afford to give. Then there"d be those who couldn"t give a cent. That would be hard on them. What we ought to do is to get up some kind of a show that the whole school would be interested in."
"That"s a fine idea. It"s public-spirited," approved Marjorie. "What sort of entertainment do you think we might give? We couldn"t give it until after examinations, though."
"I know the kind I"d like to give, but I can"t unless a certain person promises to help me," was Jerry"s mystifying reply.
"Miss Archer?" guessed Constance.
"Nope; Connie Stevens." Jerry grinned widely at Constance"s patent amazement.
"I?" she questioned. "What have I to do with it?"
"Everything. You could coax Laurie Armitage to help us and then, too, you"d be leading lady. Do you know now what I"m driving at? I see you don"t. Well, I"d like to give the "Rebellious Princess" again, one night in Sanford and the next in Riverview. That is only twenty-five miles from here. A whole lot of the Sanfordites were disappointed last year because they couldn"t get into the theatre to see the operetta. Another performance would pack the theatre, just as full as last Spring. I know the Riverview folks would turn out to it. There are two high schools in Riverview, you know. Besides, we have the costumes and everything ready.
Two or three rehearsals would be all we"d need. If we tried to give an entertainment or a play, it would take so long to practise for it. Have I a head on my shoulders or have I not?"
"You certainly have," chorused her listeners.
"I am willing to do all I can," agreed Constance. "I"ll see Laurie about it to-morrow."
"Oh, you needn"t wait until then. He"s downstairs now with Hal and Danny Seabrooke. I told Hal to ask the boys over here this evening. We can"t study all the time, you know. I suppose they are ready to tear up the furniture because we are still up here. Danny Seabrooke is such a sweet, patient, little boy. Put away your books and we"ll go down to the library. Since this is a library proposition, let"s be consistent."
A hum of girl voices, accompanied by the patter of light feet on the stairs, informed three impatient youths that they had not waited in vain.
"At last!" exclaimed the irrepressible Daniel, better known as the Gad-fly, his round, freckled face almost disappearing behind his Cheshire grin. "Long have we sought thee, and now that we have found thee--"
"Sought nothing," contradicted Jerry. "I"ll bet you haven"t set foot outside this library. There"s evidence of it." She pointed to Hal and Laurie, who had just hastily deposited foils in a corner and were now more hastily engaged in drawing on their coats. "You"ve been holding a fencing match. Laurie came out best, of course. He always does. He"s a fencing master and a musician all in one."
"Jerry never gives me credit for anything," laughed Hal. "That is, in public. Later, when Laurie"s gone home, she"ll tell me how much better I can fence than Laurie."
"Don"t you believe him. He"s trying to tease me, but I know him too well to pay any attention to what he says." Jerry"s fond grin bespoke her affection for the brother she invariably grumbled about. At heart she was devoted to him. In public she derived peculiar pleasure from sparring with him.
The trio of girls had advanced upon the library, there to hold a business session. But the keynote of the next half hour was sociability.
It was Constance who first started the ball rolling. Ensconced beside Laurie on the deep window seat, she told the young composer that Jerry had a wonderful scheme to unfold.
"Then let"s get together and listen to it," he said warmly. Three minutes afterward he had marshalled the others to the window seat.
"Everybody sit down but Jerry. She has the floor. Go ahead, Jerry. Tell us what you"d like us to do." He reseated himself by Constance. Laurie never neglected an opportunity to be near to the girl of his boyish heart.
Posting herself before her hearers with an exaggerated air of importance, Jerry made a derisive mouth at Danny Seabrooke, who was leaning forward with an appearance of profound interest, which threatened to land him sprawling on the floor. "I"m not used to addressing such a large audience," she chuckled. "Ahem! Wow!" Having delivered herself of these enlightening remarks she straightened her face and set forth her plan with her usual brusque energy. She ended with: "You three boys have got to help. No backing out."
"Surely we"ll help," promised Laurie at once. "It"s a good idea, Jerry.
I can have things going inside of a week. That is, if my leading lady doesn"t develop a temperament. These opera singers are very temperamental, you know." His blue eyes rested smilingly on Constance.
"I"m not an opera singer," she retorted. "I"m only a would-be one.
Would-be"s are very humble persons. They know they must behave well. You had better interview your tenor lead. Tenors are supposed to be terribly irresponsible."
Amid an exchange of equally harmless badinage, the six willing workers discussed the plan at length. So much excited discussion was provocative of hunger. No one, except Hal, said so, yet when Jerry disappeared to return trundling a tea wagon, filled with delectable provender, she was hailed with acclamation.
"What splendid times we always have together," was Marjorie"s enthusiastic opinion, when seated beside Hal in his own pet car she was being conveyed home. s.n.a.t.c.hes of mirthful conversation issuing from the tonneau where the rest of the s.e.xtette, Jerry included, were enjoying themselves hugely, seemed direct corroboration of her words. Invited to "come along," Jerry had needed no second urging.
"That"s your fault," Hal made gallant response. "You are the magnet that draws us all together. Before you and Jerry were friends I never realized what a fine sister I had. If you hadn"t been so nice to Constance, she and Laurie might never have come to know each other so well. Then there"s Dan. He always used to run away from girls. He got over his first fright at that little party you gave the first year you came to Sanford. You"re a magician, Marjorie, and you"re making a pretty nice history for yourself among your friends. I hope always to be among the best of them." Hal was very earnest in his boyish praise.
"I am sure we"ll always be the best of friends, Hal," she said seriously, though her color heightened at the sincere tribute to herself. "I can"t see that I"ve done anything specially wonderful, though. It"s easy to be nice to those one likes who like one in return.
It"s being nice to those one doesn"t like that"s hard. It"s harder still not to be liked."
"Then you aren"t apt to know that hardship," retorted Hal.
Marjorie smiled faintly. She had known that very hardship ever since she had come to Sanford. She merely answered: "Everybody must meet a few, I won"t say enemies, I"ll just say, people who don"t like one."
That night as she sat before her dressing table brushing her thick, brown curls, she pondered thoughtfully over Hal Macy"s words. In saying them she knew he had been sincere. It was sweet to hope that she _had_ been and was still a power for good. Yet it made her feel very humble.
She could only resolve to try always to live up to that difficult standard.
CHAPTER XX-CONSTANCE POINTS THE WAY
"THIS is a nice state of affairs," scolded Jerry Macy. "What do you suppose has happened, Marjorie?" Overtaking her friend in the corridor on the way from recitation, Jerry"s loud question cut the air like a verbal bomb-sh.e.l.l. Without waiting for a reply she continued in a slightly lower key. "Harriet has tonsilitis. Isn"t that the worst you ever heard? And only three days before the operetta, too. We can"t give it until she gets well, unless somebody in the chorus can sing her role.