Due to the numerous details Marjorie had on hand, on Saturday afternoon, Marjorie and Jerry still found themselves facing the call upon Miss Walker. They deplored the fact to each other as they made ready to go to town with Leila, Ronny, Lucy and Katherine Langly to shop for Muriel’s approaching birthday. Muriel had been left out of the shopping party. As a consequence she had made dire threats to disappear on her birthday and “spoil everything.” Jerry declared that no one was foolish enough to believe she would.
“I never realized how much work you put into that first Beauty contest, Leila Greatheart, until I saw the working out of this last one,” Marjorie confided to Leila on the way to town that afternoon. She was occupying her usual place beside Leila on the front seat. “I felt so differently about the one last night. I had a chance to hide away. I was so glad not to be in it, and on parade. It was darling in you to give me the judges’ last speech in the contest. And didn’t my fairy-tale princess look beautiful when she came forward to receive the guerdon? Those wonderful long-stemmed pink roses went so well with that crystal-beaded white frock she wore.”
“It was a dream of a dress,” Leila nodded. “At last we have a new Beauty on the campus. Only I am glad I was not one of the judges. I should never have displaced you for her. She is still too much the Ice Queen to be to my taste.”
“You are the loyalest of loyal old dears,” Marjorie’s hand came to rest for a moment on Leila’s shoulder. “I know you went strictly against your inclinations; just to please me. Someday you’ll see that there was method in my madness. The enchantment will be broken and the freed princess will yet prove herself a credit to Hamilton.”
“I doubt if I shall be here to see it,” Leila made skeptical reply. “You are feeling most optimistic because you have succeeded in wishing your beauty reputation onto someone else.”
Marjorie merely smiled. “I’m a venerable P. G. now. I’m beyond such vain frivolousness.”
“I see no signs of it,” Leila told her discouragingly. “I am sorry now that I hid you on the judges’ stand.”
“Too late,” Marjorie’s merry little laugh rippled out. Her mood was decidedly optimistic as a result of the successful way in which clever Leila had carried on the Beauty contest.
As the president of the sophs, Augusta Forbes had signed the notice of the coming contest which Leila had first posted on the main bulletin board. This fact had appeared to point to the sophs as the promoters of the Beauty contest. Privately directed by Leila, Gussie had next called a class meeting for the express purpose of arousing sophomore interest and had tactfully suggested that the contest should be held under sophomore auspices.
While the sophs were still divided into two factions, as a result of the fall elections, basket ball had done something to mitigate their wrath against one another. It seemed the irony of fate that Louise Walker and Augusta Forbes, rival centers and unfriendly classmates, should have each admired the other’s basket ball prowess. Such, however, was the situation between them. More, they were hovering on the verge of friendly acquaintance.