“Will you do it?” asked Miss Phillips.
“I can try.”
Miss Phillips’s face expressed blissful relief: she could rely upon Marjorie, who always did things well; she need worry no longer.
All that week, Marjorie studied and rehearsed. When the dress-rehearsal came, on Friday evening, the girls praised her performance; but she herself was not satisfied: she realized that her acting was stilted, and Miss Phillips was forced to agree with her when she asked for her opinion.
“But it’s all right, Marjorie,” the Captain added; “you can’t expect to do as well as Helen could, after she had practiced it for weeks.”
But Marjorie did expect to do as well as Helen, and she made up her mind to surpass her. She put the play aside from her thoughts, played a game of cribbage with Lily, and went to bed early.
Miss Phillips had planned to give the play in the outdoor theater if the day were fine. When Marjorie opened her eyes that morning and saw the bright sunlight, it was naturally the first thing she thought of. It would be so much prettier to have a background of real trees; and she felt that with such perfect surroundings she could do greater justice to the part.
Soon after breakfast, visitors began to arrive. The Wilkinsons did not especially care to attend the commencement exercises, but promised to get Jack, and drive over in the machine in time to see the play. Ruth’s father and mother were coming by train.
The programs had already been printed with Helen Stewart’s name as leading lady, and Marjorie had not told her family of her part in the play. It was enough for them to know that she was at last a Girl Scout; and she did not wish to have them disappointed if her acting did not equal their expectations.
Marjorie accompanied Ruth to meet the train on which her father and mother would arrive. They passed groups of visitors at frequent intervals on the path, and they saw the seniors, in their white dresses, many of them carrying American Beauty roses, here and there on the campus. Off under the trees, near the library, was the out-door auditorium; they distinguished Miss Phillips, directing the workmen in the final decoration of the stage.