Suiting the action to the word, Marjorie crossed the room to Lucy. “I’ve something very special to ask you, Lucy,” she said, adopting a casual tone.
Lucy frowned portentously. “What is it?” she questioned in cool, terse fashion. Mignon’s treacherous counsel still rang in her ears. Her moody frown changed to a flash of interest, however, as Marjorie stated that she and Jerry were anxious to teach her to dance. Something in Marjorie’s gay, gracious manner sent a swift rush of shamed color to Lucy’s white cheeks. Marjorie had befriended her and she had repaid her kindness by allowing suspicion to warp her belief in this delightful girl.
“I’d love to learn to dance,” she heard herself saying heartily. Then on sudden impulse she continued almost pleadingly, “You are really my friend, aren’t you, Marjorie?”
“Why, of course!” The answer conveyed absolute truth. “What makes you ask me that, Lucy?” Marjorie eyed her steadily.
Lucy’s color rose higher. “I’m glad you asked me that. I wanted to tell you something, but I didn’t know whether I’d better. It sounds gossipy.” In a few words she related what Mignon had said to her. “I shouldn’t have listened to Mignon,” she apologized. “I tried to leave her, but she kept on talking.”
Patent vexation held Marjorie speechless for an instant. When she spoke it was in a firm, almost stern manner. “I have only one thing to say, Lucy. You must not allow Mignon to make you feel that I am not your friend. Please remember that I am and hope always to be. I haven’t the least idea what she meant by saying that she knew me to be deceitful. She evidently meant me though she didn’t mention my name. I despise deceit, and I have always been straightforward with you.”
“I believe you,” Lucy earnestly assured her. “Hereafter I shall have nothing whatever to say to Mignon.”
“You must do as you think best about that. I am glad you came to me frankly. If you are in doubt at any time about me, please come to me and say so. Misunderstandings are dreadful.” Marjorie’s mind had harked back to the memory of the cloud that had once shadowed hers and Mary Raymond’s friendship.
On the way home to luncheon that day, in company with Jerry, Irma and Constance, she was unusually quiet. Her thoughts reverted gloomily to the conversation between herself and Lucy Warner. It had shown her plainly that no amount of club ethics could stop Mignon’s spiteful tongue. Her crafty attack on Lucy was merely a beginning. Into what sort of tangle her mischief-making proclivities might yet involve the Lookouts was a question which time alone would answer.
The pleasant excitement of the afternoon went far toward banishing Marjorie’s dark forebodings. The house warming was a signal success, thanks to the grateful eagerness with which the residents of the mill district received the kindly effort made in their behalf. Altogether thirty youngsters were enrolled as members of the day nursery, and their mothers showed a shy, pathetic pride and pleasure in the new movement which greatly touched their young hostesses. They did hungry justice to the dainty luncheon prepared for them, and, their diffidence gradually vanishing under the hospitable treatment they were receiving, they talked and laughed in friendly fashion with the patronesses and the Lookouts.