Marjorie Dean, Post-Graduate

Close to it a considerable number of workmen were gathered. Now in neat dark clothing instead of overalls. They had been invited by Miss Susanna to attend the ceremony and were to be given a luncheon at Hamilton Arms afterward. This was to be Jonas’ treat. Standing with them, his dark face wreathed in smiles as he talked to Peter Graham was Signor Baretti. Next to the Travelers there was no one more enthusiastic over the dormitory than Baretti.

“Look at Mr. Graham,” were Ronny’s low-spoken words as she and Robin and Marjorie paused three abreast near the cornerstone. “He’s perfectly happy. His face is so bright its positively dazzling.”

“He has the conscientiousness of work well done,” Robin returned in the same soft tone.

“That’s precisely it, Robin,” nodded Marjorie. “I’ve been watching him and trying to analyze his expression.”

“Miss Susanna will be late for the cornerstone act if she doesn’t appear in just four more minutes,” remarked Muriel practically.

“My, what a reverent spirit of mind you are in,” satirized Ronny. “‘Cornerstone act!’ I’m shocked.”

“I hope you recover. Why here comes a car! That’s not Miss Susanna’s turn-out. No horses in sight, either.” Muriel forgot to bicker with Ronny in her excitement over the rapidly approaching car.

As it came nearer the group of girls recognized a familiar figure on the front seat. It was Jerry, and she was driving. Beside her sat Jonas, his laughing features showing what he thought of the surprise.

“Jeremiah!” went up in a merry little shout from the Travelers.

“Yes, Jeremiah.” Jerry smiled complacently on her chums then slid out of the car and opened one of the rear doors of the limousine as Jonas opened the other.

Out of the limousine on one side came the Reverend Compton Greene, of Hamilton Estates, the oldest minister in the county of Hamilton. From the other side emerged Professor Wenderblatt, President Matthews and, last of all, gallantly assisted by the president came Miss Susanna.

Instead of being impressed into silence by sight of distinguished Prexy the Travelers vented a shout which more than energetically expressed their sentiments.

“How do you like my new car, children?” briskly inquired Miss Hamilton, showing frank delight at the prank she had played on her girls. “And how do you like my driver? Well, I had to come to it. I mean about the automobile. Jonas will learn to drive the car. I sha’n’t let him drive much faster than at a crawl. How are you, Peter?” She addressed her old friend with every mark of kindly affection.

“It’s a happy day for me, Susanna,” he said, his bright face faintly flushed and free from worry seemed that of a young man. Only the thick white hair brushed off his forehead proclaimed him to be in the winter of life. “And I have you to thank for it.”

“Thank yourself, Peter; not me. ‘The laborer is worthy of his hire.’ Never forget that. Come, Dr. Greene,” she turned to the old minister; “let me present my young campus friends to you. And here is Signor Baretti who is a loyal supporter of the dormitory cause.”

The last of the Hamiltons introduced the Travelers, one by one to the old minister. She talked animatedly with one of her party, then another. “I felt that I ought not invite Professor Wenderblatt’s daughter today without inviting her distinguished father,” she laughingly told Lillian Wenderblatt. In a pale gray silk gown with a beautiful gray carriage coat lined in white and a gray lace hat trimmed with a cluster of pale silk violets, Miss Susanna appeared to have shed the stiff, repressed air that had formerly hung over her.

This thought sprang to Marjorie’s mind as the old lady walked confidently about among the company and exchanged sociabilities with them. Marjorie looked up to find Jonas’ eyes fixed earnestly upon her. He glanced significantly at Miss Susanna and back to her again. She understood that he wished her to know and share his pleasure at the happiness of “Mr. Brooke’s little girl.”

Presently the company strolled to a place near the corner where the great stone would soon be set in place. There was a brief prayer in behalf of those who had gathered there to view the result of their generous efforts. Then they all sang “Blessed Be the Tie That Binds,” a favorite hymn of Brooke Hamilton’s. Miss Susanna led in her clear old treble. There were speeches from the men, even one from Signor Baretti, who responded as nobly as his limited English would permit. Miss Susanna refused to make a speech, nor could Jonas be induced to make one. Neither did Page and Dean take kindly to speech-making.

President Matthew’s earnest ringing address pleased Miss Susanna most of all. She made mental note that there was nothing mean-spirited about “that man, Matthews.” Then the workmen, under Peter Graham’s direction, came forward to place the stone and the girls and Miss Susanna dropped their envelopes into the hollowed opening. Professor Wenderblatt placed an old German writing, religious in character, with the other envelopes. The rest of the men dropped in gold and silver pieces.

As the huge block of stone was settled in the earthy pocket made for it the company joined hands and sang a verse of “Auld Lang Syne.” Miss Susanna, tears running down her cheeks, shook hands with Peter Graham and then with Jonas. They represented her only friends for many years.

“I am going to tell you all,” she said, wiping her eyes and then her glasses, “that this dear child here is responsible for anything I’ve lately done that Uncle Brooke would have wished done.” She drew Marjorie, who stood beside her, into the curve of her arm. “I cannot carry out his wishes in the way I had once planned for the college. I am sorry. I never used to be sorry. I have grown graciousness, it would seem.” She looked defiantly toward President Matthews.

“Hamilton College is grateful to you already for many favors,” the president returned with a gentle courtesy that caused two bright color signals to flash into Miss Susanna’s cheeks.

“I’ve thought something out,” Marjorie remarked suddenly to Ronny when, a little later, the party of Travelers went their way toward the campus. “It’s about Miss Susanna. I used to think, when first I knew her, that it would be splendid if she’d give the college material for Brooke Hamilton’s biography, even if she didn’t wish to give it. Now I know the gift without the giver would be bare. Nothing she might give the college that had been Mr. Brooke’s would be worth anything without her approval.”

“She will soften some day. Remember what I say,” Ronny predicted. “Look how much she has done already for the college, through us, since we have known her. Did she tell you what she wrote and put in her envelope?”

“No, I forgot to ask her. What was it?”

“She wouldn’t tell me. She said it would break the spell if she told and what she had wished might not come true. Of course she was joking, but she kept what she wrote a secret.”

“We never thought on the night we came to Hamilton, lonely freshies, and went out hungrily to hunt dinner that we’d be building a dormitory not far from where we ate our first meal,” Marjorie said musingly.

“What a stormy time we had that year! Now we may enjoy the peaceful pleasure of the P. G.,” Ronny was lightly mocking.

Marjorie smiled to herself. Into her mind had come remembrance of the two disturbing letters she had lately received. Jerry’s efforts to discover the author of the one had been fruitless. Marjorie had proudly ignored the writer of the other. Such letters did not argue well for the “peaceful pleasures of the P. G.”

“Your days of peaceful P. G. pleasure are over, Veronica Browning Lynne. You may manage the first show we shall give.”

“‘Let us then be up and doing, with a heart for any fate,’” Ronny quoted, striking an attitude.

“Something like that.” Marjorie caught Ronny’s upraised arm and drew it under her own. Ronny had brought to mind the inspiring old poem she had so greatly loved and clung to in her grammar school days. Now as ever her soul answered the call of it.

How she made it her watchword through the rest of the college year amid many perplexities and vexations will be told in: “Marjorie Dean, Marvelous Manager.”