During the automobile ride, and later at the game, it seemed to Marjorie that John was unusually quiet. Perhaps, she decided, it was because he was with strangers,—or perhaps it was because he had changed. She knew that he was working his way through college, and she wondered whether the responsibility was weighing him down. Or perhaps, she thought, he was no longer interested in so youthful a person as herself.
But to John Hadley, Marjorie Wilkinson was the same merry, charming girl who continued to hold first place in his affections.
Mrs. Andrews invited the boys to dinner after the game, and they accepted gladly. It was not until after the meal was over, and Marjorie and John were dancing in the hotel ball-room that the girl lost her shyness and felt herself back again on the old familiar ground with him.
"May I come to see you at Christmas time?" he whispered, as they glided across the floor.
"But I'm not sure that I'll be home," replied Marjorie, thinking of Frieda Hammer, and wondering whether she might not try to trace her again at that time, if she failed now.
"Are you going far away?" he pursued, in a woeful tone.
"I don't know. But you can write!"
The young people danced until the first intermission, when Mrs. Andrews rose to go, and the girls, after saying good-bye to the boys, accompanied her to the apartment.
"I looked at every waitress in the dining-room," said Marjorie, when she and Lily were alone in their room, "and I tried to see all the people I could on the streets to-day, but none of them looked like Frieda!"
"Oh, Marj! You're hopeless!" replied Lily, in exasperation. "Here I expected you to rave about John Hadley, or at least the football game, and the very minute he's gone, you begin on that girl again!"