“If you don’t mind, I am going to bring that seat over there up beside yours.” Marjorie promptly got into action. “Then we can all have a sunny morning confab. It is high time we began to get acquainted with our little sisters,” she finished laughingly.
Together she and Ronny carried the nearby seat to a place beside the one holding the two freshmen. Then conversation began afresh, a trifle stiffly at first. Soon the four were laughing merrily over Calista Wilmot’s humorous narration of her first day at Bertram Preparatory School when the taxicab driver had, at the start, misunderstood her and carried her to the opposite end of the borough in which the school was situated.
“He landed me with a flourish in front of the main entrance to the Bertram Academy for young men,” she related. “I saw a crowd of young men playing football on a side lawn. That was queer, I thought. I didn’t see a sign of a single girl. He set my luggage down on the drive. In another minute he would have been off and away. I had paid him before we started. I called out to him to wait and asked him if he was sure it was the Bertram Preparatory School for Girls. Right then we came to an understanding. Maybe I didn’t drive away from that school in a hurry. I had a perfect string of mishaps that day, big and little.” She continued to relate them to her amused listeners.
An hour slipped away unheeded by the congenial quartette under the big elm. Marjorie made no approach to the subject on her mind. The two freshmen asked numerous impersonal questions regarding Hamilton College and its traditions. They made but scant reference to their own friends except to remark that there were twelve of them at Wayland Hall.
“Look, Ronny.” Marjorie pointed to the chimes clock in the chapel tower which showed eleven. “We must go. I promised to go over to Silverton Hall to see Robin Page before luncheon. We’ll have time just for a hurried call.”
To her new acquaintances she explained: “Miss Page is a very dear friend. She came back to Hamilton on the seven-thirty train last night. Would you like to go with us to Silverton Hall? I am sure she will be glad to meet you.”
The two girls, thus invited, exchanged eager glances. It was evident both wished very much to go. Still, for some reason, they hesitated to accept.
“I don’t know—” began Calista doubtfully. “Not today, I think.” She adopted a tone of sudden decision.
“Some other day, I hope,” supplemented Charlotte Robbins, the blonde girl. She looked almost appealingly at Marjorie.
“Any day,” was Marjorie’s cordial response. “My room, or rather Miss Macy’s and my room is 15. Delighted to be of service to you. Miss Lynne and I will make you a real call some evening this week.”