"It is not often that I feel impelled to interfere in your games," she had said. "Not long since I refused to listen to something Miss Arnold tried to tell me; but, when several heartless girls deliberately combine to humiliate and discomfit a companion under the flimsy pretext of 'the good of the team' it is time to call a halt. Four girls were prime movers in this contemptible plan. One girl was an accessory, and therefore equally guilty. In justice to the traditions of Sanford High School the girl who has suffered at your hands, and in defense of my own self-respect, these offenders must be punished. So I am going to disband your team and forbid any one of you to play basketball again until I am satisfied that you know something of the first principles of honor and fair play. However, I shall not forbid basketball to the freshmen. The innocent shall not suffer with the guilty. A new team will be chosen which I trust will be a credit rather than a detriment to our high school. You are dismissed."
Five girls, whose faces were an open indication of their chagrin, had left the principal's office in a far more chastened frame of mind than when they had entered it. Miss Archer's arraignment had been a most unpleasant surprise, and in discussing it among themselves afterward, Helen Thornton had caused Mignon to pour forth a torrent of biting words by saying sulkily, that if Mignon had let Ellen Seymour alone everything would have been all right.
"Do you mean to say that you believe those miserable girls?" Mignon had cried out.
And Helen had answered with marked sarcasm, "No; I believe what I saw with my own eyes, and I wish I'd never heard of your old team. I'm ashamed to think I ever listened to you," and had walked away from the group with a sore and penitent heart, never to return to their circle again.
All this was, of course, kept strictly secret by the other four ex-members, who joined hands and vowed solemnly that they would weather the gale together. The disbanding of the team by Miss Archer and Ellen Seymour's vindication, could not be hushed up, however, and, despite their protests that Miss Archer was unfair, and that the statements of certain other girls were wholly unreliable, they lost ground with their classmates.
Marjorie, too, had been made to feel the weight of their displeasure, for they took pains to circulate the report that it was she who had told tales to the principal, and thus brought them to grief. Several of the sophomores, including Ellen Seymour, heatedly denied the rumor, and a number of freshmen also took up the cudgels in her behalf. Jerry, Irma and Constance stood firmly by her, and, although the poor little lieutenant was far more hurt over the allegation than she would show, she kept a brave face to the front and tried to ignore the ill-natured thrusts launched chiefly by Muriel and Mignon.
But in the midst of this uncomfortable season Marjorie made a wonderful discovery. It was quite by chance that she made it, and it concerned Constance Stevens. Although the Mary girl had apparently grown very fond of Marjorie and had almost entirely dropped her strange cloak of reserve, she had never invited the girl who had so graciously befriended her to her home.
From the words of vehement protest which Constance had spoken on that day when Marjorie had followed her and protested that they become friends, she had partly understood the other girl's position in regard to her family, and had tactfully avoided the subject ever afterward. She had talked the matter over with her captain, and they had decided to respect Constance's reticence and keep religiously away from anything bordering on the discussion of her family.
It was on a crisp November afternoon, several days before Thanksgiving, that Marjorie made her discovery. As she walked into the living-room, her books on her arm, her cheeks pink from the sharp, frosty air, her mother hung up the telephone with: "Marjorie, do you think Constance would like to go with us to the theatre to-night? Your father has just telephoned me that he has four tickets."
"She'd love it. I know she would. I'll hurry straight down to her house and ask her." Marjorie dropped her books on the table with a joyful thump.