“Today’s moving day, Jeremiah! We’d better pack before noon so that the man can come for our trunks soon after lunch. I shall pack for keeps. Truly, Jerry, we don’t know whether we’ll be back here again this year or not.” Marjorie turned from a yawning trunk which she had pulled into the middle of the room and surveyed Jerry solemnly.
“Well, if not this spring, then next fall,” Jerry said quickly. “Don’t weep, Bean. You will make me weep, too. I want to go to the Arms, though, and you have to go. Would you go if you weren’t going to write the biography?”
“For a little while, but not for more than that,” Marjorie said very honestly. “I’m going to miss the girls terribly, and so will you. We’ll see them often, but this is a kind of break in the good old democrat’s platform.”
“‘For larger hopes and graver fears,’” Jerry quoted. “That’s the way things are. We have to go on, you know. Life hates loiterers.”
“You’re just as melancholy over this change as I am, Jeremiah Macy!” Marjorie cried out. “It’s not fair to Miss Susanna.”
“She’ll never know it,” was Jerry’s consoling rejoinder.
“Indeed, she never shall,” Marjorie vowed energetically. “I am still a tiny bit blue about the dormitory trouble. I wish it had come to an end before we started our stay at the Arms. Mr. Graham feels worse about it than either Robin or I. I don’t allow myself to dwell on the subject of Leslie Cairns. I feel like joining Miss Susanna in giving the Hob-goblin a good shaking.”
“Your temper is certainly going to lead you to violence some day, Bean. That’s the first time I ever heard you address the Hob-goblin by her household name. It shows rising ire on your part. Let me calm you by reciting a few Bean Jingles. Ahem!
“Oh, do not rave, then long you’ll wave;
Or with the goblin fight: